


The Next Chapter Part 3: Coping With Parenthood

by pjstillnoon



Series: The Next Chapter [3]
Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: Epic, F/M, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-27
Updated: 2016-12-05
Packaged: 2018-08-11 08:40:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 50
Words: 101,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7884331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pjstillnoon/pseuds/pjstillnoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And so it continues...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_31 st December 2013_

_Tuesday_

Will sits on the end of their bed, tying his shoes. The laces are thin and short, and it takes him a few tries. It’s not easy when he’s leaning over and his pants are tight.

“Ok, what do you think?” Mackenzie asks, emerging from the walk in robe.

Will looks up, letting his foot drop to the carpet. She’s wearing a bright red wrap around dress, just above the knee, scoop neck, long sleeved, and he can see everything, including his son’s elbow as he shifts around in there for a moment (he’s given up trying to keep track of how many weeks pregnant she is, when it’s easier to start counting down. They are currently three and a half weeks out from Mackenzie’s due date). Will gets to his feet and approaches his wife, and she looks up at him, her dark eyes accentuated by smoky grey make-up, the pigmentation of her skin covered in flawless foundation. Her hair is up, in a simple ponytail, but he likes the way her pale neck is exposed. “You look beautiful,” Will tells her.

The slightly worried expression melts into a pleased, but maybe a little embarrassed smile. “Do you think so?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t think it’s too much?” She goes on, barely letting him answer. She gestures to her stomach.

“No!” Will says vehemently. “You look great. _Really_ great.”

“I think you look really great,” she says, suddenly switching to a confident smile, her dark eyes coy. Her hand reaches for his arm and she moves closer.

“Thank you,” Will responds.

She smooths her other hand up his chest, running her fingers alongside the studs of his shirt. The studs were a Christmas present from Mackenzie, matching the cuff links she was going to give him as his groom’s gift. He’s only supposed to wear them with the French style kind of shirt, and he only has one of those, the one that goes with his tuxedo. So his excuses and ability to wear them will be few, aside from on New Year’s Eve, unless he buys new shirts. Mackenzie’s hand reaches the top of his shoulder and he feels pressure, indicating she wants him to stoop. He bends his knees a little and she reaches up, still barefoot, to give him a soft kiss. “The tux really does something for me,” she whispers against his mouth and he feels a strong pull in his groin.

God.

Will’s hands find their way to her waist, steadying her and holding her, and steadying himself. “That dress is definitely doing something for me,” he answers and moves forward to kiss her again. She gives him a happy hum and then pushes him away.

“I haven’t finished getting ready,” she steps away.

Tease.

But neither has he. He follows her into the closet to get his cuff links from the top drawer on his side. Behind him, Mackenzie’s clothes are starting to creep over the halfway mark. But that’s ok. He couldn’t buy enough clothes for himself in a lifetime to fill the space that is their walk in closet. He concentrates on his sleeve, folding the material of his left arm up to form the cuff at his wrist. This is the tricky part, he has to line up the holes in the cuff and then insert the cuff link to hold it, and close the clasp at the back. With one hand. He doesn’t manage it the first time.

“Need some help?”

Will looks up at his wife. She’s got shoes (flats, and it’s a shame, because she’d look even hotter in sexy heels) on and is watching him. He’s not sure how this has happened, but she’s ready before him. “Sure,” he says. He extends his arm to her and she comes over to take his sleeve, and then the cufflink from his fingers.

“How does this work?”

“The front of the link should at the front, when my hand is at my side,” Will directs. “And you feed it through from the front and close the clasp at the back,” he talks her through it. She does it easily.

“Like that?”

“Yeah,” he says. She lowers his hand to his side while he raises the other one for her to fix. He hasn’t folded this sleeve but it’s not hard to figure out. It’s kind of nice, being dressed by his wife. He likes her attentiveness. And from his height advantage, and the way she leans, he can see down the front of her dress.

“All done,” Mackenzie announces, lowering his right hand to his side.

Will gives her fingers a squeeze, “Thank you,” he says softly and she gives him a happy smile.

“What’s next?” She asks.

“Tie,” Will says, and takes it from the bottom drawer with his left hand, because she still has his right.  
“I have no idea how to tie a bowtie,” Mackenzie muses.

“It’s an art,” Will answers her, turning for the mirror.

“Show me.”

So he does, tying the tie slowly so she can see the placement of the material and the way they form the knot. Because he’s not concentrating properly, it comes out crooked. He pulls it loose to start over.

“I’ll try,” Mackenzie jumps in, reaching for the black strips of material.

Sure, why not, Will thinks. If she can’t manage it, he can always try again himself. He can’t see what she’s doing, not with the bowtie at his throat, and it’s weird trying to work out opposites in the mirror, but actually, she does a pretty good job. He adjusts one side and it’s, “Perfect,” he tells her. She gives him a slight smile.

“Jacket?”

“Jacket,” Will agrees. He doesn’t mean for her to get it, but she does, sliding it off the hangar and then holding it up for him. He slips into one arm first, and turns to slide the other in. Mackenzie lifts it to his shoulders and he stoops a little so she doesn’t have so far to reach. He adjusts the jacket at his neck and checks his sleeves as he turns around to face his wife again. He reaches for one last thing. A pocket square. Mackenzie takes it from him and puts it in his breast pocket, fussing for a moment to make sure it’s straight, and that not too much is poking out.

“Very handsome,” she compliments. “And I see you got a haircut for the occasion?”  
“I was due,” Will says. He does like she noticed.

They head for the door. Will helps Mackenzie with her coat and then slips into his. He’s gotten out his good scarf and leather gloves and he’d wear a hat too, if he could get away with jamming it low over his ears. He’ll have to suck it up. He is a little worried that Mackenzie’s bare legs might freeze but she just quirks a lip at him and tells him that they better hurry from the building to the car and then inside once they get to the party.

 

**********

 

This situation is funny for two reasons. The first is that, with the rise in Mackenzie’s profile, she got invited to quite a few New Year’s Eve parties herself. Coupled with the several Will was invited to, and that she wants to stop by ACN for the News Night party ( _we can’t neglect our news night family Billy_ ), for the actual countdown to midnight, they had a serious debate about where they were going to go this evening, so they didn’t offend anyone (the wrong people) by declining. The second funny thing is, and this might be more amusing, in an interesting way, is that even though they’re at Bloomberg’s (they _had_ to, it’s technically his last night in office), in a room full of people Will’s moved in circles with for years now, he hardly has to make an introduction (of his wife. He has to introduce her to the people that already know her by name). He doesn’t have to worry that his wife might feel out of place. And he doesn’t have to worry that he’ll have to do all the talking.

Mackenzie’s reputation is starting to precede her. People know about Charlie’s death, and her promotion, and some are avidly interested to see where she takes the network, now that it’s been sold. More than a few are interested in their personal relationship (the fact that they formerly dated, and then suddenly got married, along with the pregnancy – and then there’s the pregnancy), and with Mackenzie now being Will’s boss. If she’s bothered by the personal questions and intrusions, like Will is a little, Mackenzie doesn’t let it show. She brushes off the worst with a (false) laugh, changes subjects like a pro, and knows a little about everyone they talk to (even if she doesn’t recognise them by their faces), so there’s no awkward silence or faux pas. Will hardly has to say a thing in the way of small talk, because Mackenzie does it all for him. He only has to follow the conversation and agree or disagree or remember that someone recently had a granddaughter.

Christ he loves this woman. She’s his perfect compliment. He has never felt less anxious about being at a party in his life.

And she’s stunningly beautiful.

She comes across with an easy grace that he’s proud to have on his arm, even though he knows her to sometimes be entirely clumsy, especially when she’s nervous. She must not be nervous now though, even though she doesn’t really know anyone here. She’s a total pro. But this is her wheelhouse. Give her a decent ten minutes with someone in a quiet space and she’ll get their life story, half by conversation, and the rest by entire intuitive deduction, so she does half as well in a room loud with music and conversation and alcohol. Will’s had one glass of champagne, and feels red in the face. He got Mackenzie an orange juice, but has noticed she’s been carrying it around all evening without drinking it. He wonders what’s going on there when Mackenzie excuses them from the group they’re talking to, and physically moves him to a space to the side of hallway.

“What’s going on?” Will asks. Did he miss something?

“I think we should go now.”

“Oh, ok,” he takes her drink when she offers it to him.

“I don’t think I’m going to make it to midnight.”

Will raises his eyebrows at her slightly.

“I’m tired,” Mackenzie confesses and Will’s not sure, but he thinks he sees a splash of tears in her eyes. It’s a little desperation. She still thinks she can do everything.

“That’s ok,” he says immediately, rubbing her upper arm with his free hand. He looks around for somewhere to stash the OJ. Nothing. No waiter in sight.  “We can go home if you want to.” He has no idea what time it is.

“No, I want to see the others. I said we would.”

“Sure,” he nods. He makes eye contact with a waiter and signals him to come over. He thanks him and plops the drink on his tray.

“Can I get you something else sir?”

“No thank you,” Will dismisses. He focuses back on his wife. “Ok, well, I should probably say goodbye to some people. Do you want to just meet me at the coats?”

“Yes,” Mackenzie says firmly. “Perfect plan. I might also use the bathroom before we go. Fifteen minutes?”

“Done,” Will leans forward to plant a kiss on her forehead. She gives him a frown as he walks away. He finds Mayor Bloomberg first. They talked earlier but he makes it know he’s going to leave and wishes the man luck with whatever he’s doing next, knowing that tomorrow, he doesn’t have to worry about the city. He finds Police Commissioner Kelly in the next room, and says his goodnights to him too. They golfed once and he’s also out of office as of tomorrow. Kelly wishes him luck with the baby, and Will thanks him. It’s polite chit chat. And fifteen minutes of it is quite enough.

Will excuses himself when he finds a gap and makes his way through the venue to the exit. Mackenzie is waiting for him, both their coats draped over her arm. She looks wary. He hopes he didn’t keep her waiting for too long. “Ready?” She asks.

“Let’s go,” Will says. He slips into his coat and helps Mackenzie into hers, and loves that she waits for him to be able to do so. He wraps his scarf around her neck and she gives him an amused, but slightly pleased, smile.


	2. Chapter 2

“In all seriousness,” Mackenzie says as they swipe through security at the base of the AWM building. “How many of those women at the party would you consider taking home, if we weren’t married?”

Will just about walks into a wall, as he turns back to look at her. “What women?”

“Nice try,” Mackenzie catches up to his side. “The plus one’s.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Will says sincerely as they walk around to the elevators. It’s quiet down here. No parties and no people, hardly any noise, and it’s cool. His face seems to have calmed down. Probably helps that it’s icy outside.

“You know, all the hot young women you take to a prestigious party because they look good on your arm?”

“Still have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Mackenzie looks up at him as he reaches to push the button to call an elevator. “Are you pretending or do you –”

“I genuinely didn’t notice any of the other women at the party. Except when we were talking to them, and not really even then. And I certainly didn’t notice if any of them were more beautiful than you, because I only notice you.”

Mackenzie gives him a slow smile as the doors ping open. Will waits for her to step in first, then reaches for the button to take them up to the twenty-first floor. Mackenzie reaches for his hand. “It’s a good answer Billy.”

“Where’s this coming from?” He asks softly and looks down at her.

“I was twice the size of some of those women.”

“You’re pregnant,” he points out gently. “You’re supposed to be. If you weren’t, I’d be concerned, and not twice their size. Normal size, but pregnant.”

“Have you seen my ankles recently?”

“I love your ankles.”

Mackenzie scoffs a laugh as the car comes to a halt and the doors ping open.

“Very fond memories of them hooked around my neck.”

Mackenzie shoots him a slightly incredulous, slightly amused expression. “I’ve _never_ been that flexible.”

“Tied to the end of the bed.”

She might blush a little.

Will waits for her to step out first, and they can hear the party; music and people. Will can’t say he feels more relaxed for being there (small talk will still have to abound), but it’s a step up from the more formal event Bloomberg was hosting. He feels a pang for Charlie’s absence in ringing in the New Year. He didn’t usually come to the News Night parties, but New Year’s Eve is when reflection of the year past happens, and Will’s thinking about it.

They move into the bullpen and the noise increases. Someone, or a few people, have decorated the space in cheap dime store decorations; banners and crepe paper. But there’s a legitimate bar and a legitimate DJ and no one seems to care what the place looks like, because the crowd is large, there are smiles all round and no sign of Nina Howard. There are faces there he doesn’t know, so there will be a chance to just walk up to somebody and talk to them.

Will helps Mackenzie with her coat, and takes them both to his office. He’s tempted to stay there, where it’s relatively quiet and cool and quiet. But no, he must socialise, and there is absolutely no chance he’s going to be accused of trying to kiss anyone but his wife. He heads back out and runs into Sloan. Literally.

“Sorry,” he reaches for her to steady her.

“What’s your damage McAvoy?”

“Sorry,” he says again. They eye each other up. “You look nice,” he says politely.

“So do you. Bloomberg’s again?”

“Yeah.”

“Is Mackenzie here?”

“Yeah, she’s,” he looks over the room to see if he can spot her. “She’s here somewhere,” he says to Sloan.

“Cool. You just get here?”

“Yeah.”

“Want a drink?”

“Sure,” Will agrees. They move towards the drinks table.

 

 

**********

 

Will looks around the room. Ok, so he’s at least said hello to most of the staff. Mackenzie is sitting at a desk cluster, talking to Sloan and Kelli. She’s tired but she refuses to go home. She wants to see the New Years in, from here. Not from home. Not asleep. She wants to be here and awake because next year, she’s probably going to be too tired to bother. Or so she says. Honestly, Will would be ok with going home. He’s socialled out. And he’s hiding on the edge of the crowd. He’s tempted to tell Mackenzie that they’re going to leave, but that wouldn’t be right. He’s tempted to ask her if she’ll leave with him, but that doesn’t seem right either. Does he need to ask permission or demand, or what’s the third option? Beg?

When he figures it out, he’s going to talk to her. Until then, he’s going to talk to this woman, who isn’t talking to anyone.

“Hi,” Will approaches her elbow. “I’m Will.”

She turns and gives him a smile. “McAvoy,” she finishes. She extends a hand. “Nice to meet you. I’m Rachel.”

“Rachel?” Will queries, more to himself. The name seems familiar. Does he know a Rachel?

“I’m Kelli’s wife,” Rachel says pleasantly, pointing over with her free hand to where Kelli is sitting with Mackenzie, Sloan and now Kendra.

“Ah,” Will clicks. He withdraws his hand. Now what? “Are you having a good time?”

“Sure,” Rachel smiles easily again. “It’s nice to meet everyone that I hear about on a daily basis.”

Will gives her a wry smile. He doesn’t know what to say to that either. “What do you do?”

“I – well before I had my kids I was working in day care.”

“You don’t say,” Will says, interested.

“But I’ve been pretty dedicated to the girls. They’ve started in pre-K so I’ve been looking for part time work.”

Will nods. “Why did you decide to stay at home?”

Rachel raises her eyebrows at him.

“I just mean, Mackenzie and I have been talking about it recently, so I’m just curious,” he gives her wide eyes of innocence. “You obviously advocate day care.”

“I think day care has its place,” Rachel starts genially. “But it’s also complicated. I wanted to spend the time with my girls. And we were in a position to be able to allow me to do that. I know for some mother’s they don’t really have that choice, so I’d like to think I can give them a great alternative. Depending on where I’m working,” she adds with a slight laugh.

Will smiles politely.

“You’d have to make a decision that’s right for you.”

“But what is the right decision? Is there anything wrong with kids in day care? I mean,” Will corrects himself. “Do they turn out all right?”

“You’d have to read the research,” Rachel says. Will suspects it’s a brush off. But she adds, “There is some evidence to suggest children in full time day care don’t do as well as other kids, or children who are in day care for less than twenty hours a week.”

Will feels his heart palpitate. He’s going to find the research for sure now.

“But again, I’m not telling anyone what they should be doing in their lives or how they should raise their children.”

“No,” Will dismisses unease. “No, I’m just curious to hear your opinion.”

Rachel gives him an easy smile.

“How young is too young to put a kid in day care?”

“Well, some day cares have age limits, but I don’t know if anyone’s done research on it, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Will gives a nod. They look out at the bull pen.

“My advice?” Rachel asks and Will turns to her again, raising his eyebrows to invite her to go on. “Don’t worry about it so much. You can cripple yourself with trying to be ‘perfect’ when really your kids just need you to love them.”

“I want to do the best by him.”

“I’m sure you will,” she offers kindly.

“I hope so,” Will adds softly.

“If your decisions are guided by love, then they’ll be good decisions,” Rachel adds, as her wife approaches.

“Hey,” Kelli greets. “Where’d you get to?” She slips her arm around Rachel’s waist and stands close to her. Will watches them intently. He doesn’t know Kelli very well, and has never met Rachel before. He’s curious to see them together. To see how another couple works. Not because he needs pointers (he wants a gauge to compare he and Mackenzie to).

“Will and I were just talking about day care,” Rachel says to her and Will sees the way she smiles differently at her wife. They’re obviously in love then. He wonders if he looks at Mackenzie that way. He often catches her looking at him like that.

“Oh ok,” Kelli looks up at him, with a smile. He can see she wants to ask him about it, but she refrains, and he’s actually really glad she does. He doesn’t want to get into it right at this instance. He might talk to her about it sometime, another time, but for now, “I’m going to find Mackenzie.” Kelli and Rachel both give him smiles as he turns away.

It should be easy to find his wife in her bright red dress. But it is not. He does a casual walk around and doesn’t see her. She wouldn’t be out on the balcony, but maybe she went to sit in his office? He’ll go check. It’s a good excuse to take a breather.

So, interesting conversation, but he still doesn’t feel close to an answer about day care or staying at home with the baby. He’s a little freaked out by the idea that day care could be harmful and it feels overwhelming, this desire to do right by his child, to be ‘perfect’ so his kid doesn’t turn out all fucked up because he was too careless as a parent. He wants to be able to talk to Charlie about it, but he’s gone, and he doesn’t have any other close male friends. The only guy Will knows with kids is Elliot, and, no offense, he’s not really a guy whose advice Will wants to follow. Gideon hasn’t had his baby yet. He wonders what Gideon and his wife are going to do. Income _will_ be an issue for them.

Will’s office door opens, and he turns from standing in the middle of the floor, staring at a dark New York city beyond his office window, to see his wife come in. “Hey,” she greets with a tired smile. “Are you hiding?”

“A little,” Will turns. She walks to him and slips her arms around his waist. “I’d really like to go home,” he says softly.

“Me too,” she almost whispers. “But I came to find you to say it’s a minute until midnight. Do you think you could hang on literally a minute longer? Then we can leave right after the ball drops.”

Will leans down to give her a quick kiss. “Sure.”

“I saw you were talking to Rachel.”

“Yeah.”

“What are you talking about?” Mackenzie asks lightly. Totally fishes.

“I’ll tell you tomorrow,” Will says gently. “Let’s go back out and get this over with.” He steps back and Mackenzie takes his hand, so they walk back to the bullpen together. Will leads them right to the centre of the space and looks up at the clock to see the minute hand practically on the twelve. He turns to his wife and draws her closer and she looks up at him and smiles, her eyes sleepy but sexy and he feels his heart again. His over large heart, full up with love for her. And for their son, when he arrives later this month.

The ten second countdown starts but Mackenzie doesn’t join in, and neither does he. They just stare at each other. And on ‘one!’ Will leans down to kiss her softly, cupping her jaw with his hand. Balloons rain down on them and everyone cheers loudly, but Will just gives his wife another soft kiss. “Happy new year,” he murmurs into her ear. He feels her fingers curl into the hair at the back of his head, holding him in place.

“Happy new year Will.”


	3. Chapter 3

_18 th January 2014_

_Saturday_

_D-Day -7_

Will wakes slowly and in stages. He’s aware of lack of noise first, then orientates his body in bed, and then in the room. He’s facing the windows and he feels really well rested. And then it occurs to him that his very pregnant wife is in bed with him and he turns over to see how she’s doing. She’s asleep. He wonders what time it is and turns back for the clock on his nightstand. It’s after ten. They’ve both slept in. Huh.

Will sneaks out of bed very carefully so he doesn’t disturb Mackenzie (she seems to sleep so very shallowly these days, if she isn’t awake before him anyway) and uses the bathroom. After he washes his hands he creeps open the bathroom door a few inches at time until he can poke his head back into the bedroom. Mackenzie hasn’t moved. There’s a chance she’s still asleep. He literally tiptoes to the bedroom door and opens that slowly and carefully and sneaks out. He pads down the polished wooden hallway floor to the kitchen. On the bench are the new baby bottles, still in their box, waiting to be sterilised for first use. Will makes himself coffee, and Mackenzie tea. He makes toast and grabs a banana. He also grabs water from the fridge, and the vitamin supplements Mackenzie takes. He gathers it all on a tray, and when it’s all ready, he heads back to the bedroom.

Mackenzie is sitting up in bed, picking sleep from her eyes. “Hey,” she greets him.

“Good morning,” Will says, coming closer with the tray.

“What’s all this?”

“Breakfast,” he says, even though it’s obvious. “Do you need the bathroom first?”

“I went earlier,” Mackenzie says, straightening out the cover so he can put the tray over her thighs. The extra pillows she sleeps with are at her back to keep her propped up. “I didn’t even hear you get up.”

Will gives a slight shrug, before he gets back into bed next to her.

“Hey, want to hear something?” Mackenzie asks, as she picks up her tea in one hand, and a piece of toast in the other.

Will thinks of about three completely inappropriate answers to that, but reaches for his coffee wordlessly, giving her raised eyebrows to indicate she should go on anyway.

“My mucous plug is starting to fall away.”

Will looks up at her sharply, spluttering his coffee.

“I know, kind of gross, but I thought I’d share,” she looks over at him casually, sipping her tea (he put a little cold water in there so she could drink it right away).

While Will blinks at her a moment, she starts on her toast. What does it mean when the mucous plug starts to fall away? “It’ll be soon then,” he says, indicating her belly with his head. He feels a little pang of nerves, even though the mucous plug can fall away weeks before the actual birth, it still means the birth is getting closer.

“Hm,” Mackenzie agrees, but she’s not entirely nonchalant about that one. She reaches for another piece of toast.

“Maybe a few weeks though,” Will adds, testing how she feels about that. He reaches for toast himself.

“Maybe,” Mackenzie agrees, chewing bread. 

She’s hard to read, which means, if Will has to hazard a guess, she’s worrying about it a little. Just a little, because if it were full on worrying, she’d be _very_ talkative about it. If she weren’t worried at all, she’d be talking about something else instead.

It is getting close though. They’ve pretty much given up on counting how many weeks pregnant she is, since she was considered full term at the end of thirty-seven weeks, and are now counting down how many weeks until the due date. A week exactly today, so it happens. The baby has turned, but hasn’t dropped, and now the mucous plug is falling away. It means the birth will happen soon, but then, they knew that. It really could happen any day, but Will thinks assuming the baby will be overdue is good. It helps with his anxiety. It’s scary thinking the baby is due next Saturday. It’s much less scary to think, if he’s overdue say, a week, that they still have two more weeks to be mentally prepared.

 

 

**********

 

What Mackenzie didn’t realise about her Christmas present from Will, was that it wasn’t just for _one_ three-hour pre-natal massage, facial and pregnant-belly skin care add-on package, but for _three_. Which means, after she held out and waited until after New Year’s, Will finally asked her when she was going to start using them, given that the weekends would quickly run out before her due date arrived. This is the last one though. It really has been the best present. He’s so thoughtful. And he’s been amazing, the last three weeks. If she didn’t know better, she might think he were trying to atone for not telling her about his heart, but that’s not true. He’s always had a way of doing things. Of making sure the nightlight is on, and that she has her body pillow, and that she takes a break at lunch time to eat.

He’s organised the house keeper to wash and dry all the baby clothes (not that she particularly takes care of their laundry, but she was ok with doing a few extra tasks to help with baby-preparation), and started an account with a car service so Mackenzie doesn’t have to hail a cab, or take the subway, or walk. Not while she’s _this pregnant_ (or ever again, because he started that account with a family-friendly car service that has car seats, so that the moment they leave the hospital with their baby, they can bring him home safely). He booked flights for her parents, and kept the dates conveniently open for the second half of February. They can come any time then. But not before.

He made sure their health insurance was up to date, and would include their son, whenever he does decide to arrive (he just needs to make a phone call to let it all drop into place). He’s had his will redone, and made an appointment with his lawyer so Mackenzie could do hers (and then he rescheduled it because she forgot). He’s helped her do everything on her list she wanted to get done before the baby is born, as well as doing most of them himself when she’s been too busy with work, or too tired on the weekend, to get around to them herself. Like taking down all the Christmas decorations and packing them away in their boxes and putting them back in the _correct_ cupboards, with the labels facing out, so they can find them again (she checked, after she got up one morning and found everything done. Her little nocturnal elf has been at it again). And getting rid of the Christmas tree before it died and dropped needles all over the floor.

He put a phone charger in the hospital bag. Mackenzie discovered that one three days after she’d packed it (repacked it. For the third time) and panicked a little for forgetting the cable (which was why she was going to put a charger in there now, even though the birth is still weeks away). But not just that, he went and got a new one, so that neither of them have to give up the ones beside their beds (she was going to, but happily plugged it back in).

He’s stocked the cupboards. And not just with the regular kind of food they usually get, he’s gone ahead and bought food that they can cook in five minutes, or snack on; things that don’t require so much effort, because a website suggested it. He tidied up after the baby shower while she napped. Entirely squared away the apartment, and put all the new presents (baby clothes, blankets, soft toys, other toys, diapers etc) in the baby’s room, and cleaned up the mess Sloan made in the kitchen properly. He even mopped the floor.

He’s a walking saint. She swears it.

When she gets back from the day spa, and comes into the apartment, Mackenzie hears music. Not music on the stereo either, actual man-made music. Guitars. A guitar and a bass. And Will’s singing, though she can’t make out words, just the lilt of his voice. She takes off her jacket and woollen hat, and unwinds her scarf slowly and quietly, not because she might disturb him (them? Although, he might stop if he knows she’s come in. He hasn’t played in a million years… She thinks. He hasn’t played around her in a long time anyway, but who knows what he gets up to when she’s not around.), but so that she can listen. She wonders who his accompaniment is. Could be Jim, he plays guitar, but it’s not a guitar she can hear, it’s a bass guitar, on an amp that is accompanying Will’s acoustic

There – that bit sounds familiar. She kicks off her shoes by the door, and slips instead into wool lined slippers (so comfy on her sore feet). She moves through to the kitchen, taking an indirect approach to the living room. She makes out more of the song. It’s Led Zepplin. Classic. Of course, it’s stripped back for an acoustic guitar, but it still sounds great, even though it suddenly stops. Mackenzie moves forward from the dining room.

“There it goes to the A suspended four,” a young voice says. Mackenzie comes in to see it’s Charlie’s grandson Beau. He’s reaching over from the armchair to physically lift Will’s finger, but he looks over at Mackenzie as she walks over, and so Will does the same. He looks happy.

“Hi,” he greets her, standing. Beau stands with him.

“Hi,” Mackenzie returns with a smile.

“You remember Beau?” Will introduces them.

“I do,” Mackenzie says, sliding her arm around her husband’s back. He reaches in to give her a quick kiss. “Sounds great.”

“Beau’s teaching me to read tabs.”

“I don’t know what that means,” Mackenzie looks up at him, a hapless expression on her face.

“It’s a different way of chords,” Will says, sounding like he doesn’t really know what that means either.

“How’s he doing?” Mackenzie asks Beau.

“Very well,” he responds politely.

She turns back to Will. “I’m going to go lie down.”

“Oh ok, we’ll stop,” he says as she steps away.

“Oh no, please don’t stop. I’m not going to sleep, just want to lie down, while I’m still blissfully massaged. It was nice to see you again Beau,” she says to him, picking her away across coils of guitar leads for the door.

“You too Mrs McAvoy.”

“Oh please, Mac,” she turns back to correct him. He gives her a nod of acknowledgement. As she heads into the hall she hears Will suggest they turn the amp down.

 

 

**********

 

Will helps carry Beau’s amp down to his car. He also has to let him out of the parking garage, so it’s not really a chore. He thanks the young man for teaching him to read tabs and Beau says it was nice to hang out. It really was, Will thinks. They should have done it months ago.

“We’ll do it sometime again after the baby’s born,” Will suggests.

“Sure,” Beau gives him a slight smile. “Maybe a while after.”

Will gives a chuckle. “Yeah a while after. I’ll practice in the meantime.”

“I’ll send you some other songs to learn,” Beau suggests (or threatens).

“Great,” Will enthuses. Beau opens his car door and gets in. “Drive safely,” Will instructs. The sun’s still up, but it’s winter, and it’s been snowing and the roads could be treacherous.

“I will,” Beau promises. He starts the car and Will backs off to let him pull out of the park that’s reserved for their apartment, and which is never used because neither he nor Mackenzie own a car. He walks near the exit so the sensor will pick up on the fob in his pocket that will open the gate, and he waits until Beau has driven through before pressing it again to close it. He heads back upstairs to a now quiet apartment. They played another half hour after Mackenzie got home, and without having to check, Will knows she would have fallen asleep. If she’s still long enough, she tends to. Sure enough, when he gets to the bedroom he finds her with her eyes closed but just as he’s leaving again she calls to him.

“Did I wake you?” He asks on a whisper, coming further into the room.

“I’m not sleeping,” Mackenzie says. “Just resting my eyes.”

“That means sleeping,” Will comes to stand by the bed.

Mackenzie reaches out to take his hand and tugs on him, like she wants him to sit with her. He perches on the edge of the mattress. “Did you have fun playing your toons?”

“My toons?” Will gives a slight laugh.

“It’s so nice to hear you playing again,” Mackenzie says seriously, her dark eyes steady on his, fathomless with the emotion they show him. Will’s thinking of something to say when she goes on. “It’s been so long.”

“Yeah,” he agrees. “I said to Beau that we’d play together at Charlie’s funeral.”

“I was meaning just you. You haven’t played – I haven’t heard you play in forever.”

Will gives a slight shrug. “I haven’t.”

Mackenzie watches him, eyebrows slightly up, an invitation for him to open up a little. If he wants to.

“I haven’t felt like it,” Will admits.

“And you do now?”

“I guess so. I don’t know. Yes. But it was more that I was thinking about Beau and remembered my suggestion.”

“What were you thinking about Beau?” Mackenzie asks softly.

“That his granddad died,” Will says. Mackenzie’s eyes soften on his and just as she opens her mouth to say something, his phone starts ringing. Will waits, but she doesn’t speak, so he takes his phone from his pocket to see who’s calling him. If Mackenzie’s here, then who can it possibly be?

The caller ID says: Charlie.


	4. Chapter 4

Mackenzie notices the way Will freezes and his face looks shocked, staring down at his phone. “Who is it?” She asks, confused and a little concerned.

“Charlie,” Will croaks out, looking up at her, while his phone continues to ring.

“What?” Mackenzie asks, alarmed. Will shows her the screen, and for a second she has no idea what to say. “Answer it,” she directs.

Will picks up the call. “Hello?” He listens for a moment.

 _Should have told him to put it on speaker,_ Mackenzie thinks.

“Nancy,” Will says with feeling, his face relaxing, his entire body calming. Mackenzie relaxes too. No calls from beyond the grave. “Yes, no, it’s fine. You had me –” He pauses while he listens and then his eyes slide to hers. “Uh, sure, that’s very – let me just check with Mackenzie.”

He puts the phone to his chest to cover the microphone. “Nancy’s invited us for lunch tomorrow.”

Mackenzie raises her eyebrows high with surprise. “Yes,” she says to the unspoken question of ‘do you want to go?’ She assumes he wants to go, otherwise he wouldn’t have checked if she wanted to. He would have given her a silent signal that said he wanted to get out of it. Or immediately lied to Nancy without checking with Mackenzie at all.

Will puts the phone back to his ear. “That would be really great. Twelve thirty. No problem. See you then. Thank you.” He ends the call and stares at his phone for a second, and then looks at Mackenzie. “I thought it was Charlie. Swear he was calling me from the beyond.”

Mackenzie gives a huff of a laugh and Will’s face blooms into a smile. There’s a lot more smiling these days too, along with the guitar playing. “That was Nancy?” She moves the conversation back on track to things like ‘what the hell was that about?’

“Yeah, said she would have called sooner but wasn’t sure where to find my number.”

‘ _Hm,’_ Mackenzie thinks. Plausible. Maybe.

“Anyway. She really wants to see us. Beau reminded her that it’s been a while.”

“It has,” Mackenzie agrees. Though, Charlie was Will’s friend, so Nancy doesn’t need to feel obligated in any way. “It’s nice,” she says aloud.

“Yeah,” Will agrees. “I’d like to see her. I didn’t get much of a chance to talk to her at the funeral.” He slips his phone back into his pocket. “And,” he starts but gets a distant look in his eye and Mackenzie assumes he means: and he’s been thinking about Charlie a lot recently. “So, how’d your thing go?”

“What thing is that?” Mackenzie asks to be facetious.

“The spa?”

“It was lovely,” she says, melting a little. “I’m sad that was the last one.”

“I’ll get you more,” Will says immediately.

Mackenzie squeezes his hand to stop him from moving, just in case he was thinking to do that right now. “Surprise me for mother’s day or something. I don’t think before the baby’s born will fit. Of course, I’m also going to expect _jewellery_ for mother’s day.”

“Ok.”

“And plastic surgery to put my body back to the way it was before I got pregnant. I’m quite fond of my vagina the way it is now.”

“Me too,” Will says absently, and then looks over at her and smiles again, an almost lewd grin, but not quite. Mackenzie laughs and swats at his arm, even though they’re still holding hands. She only manages to wave his hand around in the air, because he’s stronger than she is.

“I did get everything tidied up down there though.”

“What does that mean?”

“You know,” Mackenzie says lightly. Will looks to her hip (maybe a little south of her hip) curiously. “I didn’t say all off, I said tidied, for those who may be having a look in the next week or so.”

Will meets her eye again, and although the glint in his is a little mischievous, he says, with seriousness, “I’m glad you had a nice time. You smell nice too.”

“They used this grapefruit scrub on my tummy. Supposed to help with the stretch marks.”

“Do you have stretch marks?”

“Wow, it’s really been a while huh?”

Will doesn’t look away. Their lack of sex life this time, is Mackenzie’s fault.

“It’s a constant threat, Will. A constant threat.”

 

**********

 

“Nancy knows I’m pregnant, right?”

Will looks over at his wife. She’s stirring the beef stroganoff. He’s getting inventive with these beef dishes now. And he might, he _might,_ be ok if they don’t have beef for a while after the baby’s born and _hopefully_ the craving wears off. He might also feel that way about rice. “I think everyone knows by now.”

“I just mean – oh you mean because it’s in the tabloids?”

Will gives a pout of his mouth. Sure, that’s what he meant. “Or maybe she heard at Charlie’s wake.”

“I guess we’ll find out tomorrow when she answers the door.”

Will sets the red wine in the pan on fire. It makes a huge ‘woosh’ and flames on for a few seconds, then goes out. He tips the wine into the sauce Mackenzie is stirring.

“You took all the fun out of that,” she says.

“You’re not supposed to be drinking.”

“There was hardly any alcohol – that was probably the equivalent of a thimble-full,” Mackenzie complains. Will ignores her, and puts the pan in the sink, rinsing it out. That’s probably true. But setting the wine on fire was fun. “Hey,” Mackenzie starts slyly. Will looks over at her. “Do you think we should talk to Nancy about using Charlie’s name?”

Will stares at her.

“Not because it’s trademarked,” Mackenzie goes on. “But because – I think we should tell her that we want to honour Charlie in that way. It might be nice.”

“It is nice,” Will says. “You don’t think it would make her feel uncomfortable?”

“Why would it make her feel uncomfortable?”

Will shrugs. “A constant reminder that her husband is dead? I don’t know. I just wouldn’t want to upset her.”

“You know her better than I do, do you think it would upset her?”

“I don’t know her that well.”

“You’re making me feel paranoid now,” Mackenzie complains again. “I wasn’t worried at all about naming the baby after Charlie and now –”

“Sorry,” Will says stepping forward. He slides his hands to either side of their son. “I’m sure it’s fine. It’s me. I worry about these things. If you think it’s fine it probably will be. She won’t be offended.” He stoops to give her a quick kiss.

“You big lug,” Mackenzie mutters, but she tilts her head to kiss him again. “Is it ready? I’m hungry.”

“I’ll check the rice,” Will says, moving around her.

 

**********

 

“Have I ever told you, you’re very good with your hands?” Mackenzie says lightly.

Will presses his fingers along her spine. “There used to be frequent and loud compliments, as I recall.” He doesn’t need to check her face to know that she’s probably smirking.

“Can you believe I’m due in a week?”

“Yeah,” Will says, moving his fingers up an inch on her spine.

“You can?”

“No, I meant, you were suggesting it was hard to believe, and I was agreeing with that. It’s hard to believe we’re at the end.”

“It feels like a long year,” Mackenzie muses.

“It’s only the end of January,” Will moves his fingers up another inch. It hasn’t even been a month, let alone a year.

“I meant the whole – the last year in – not a calendar year. I mean, since April, last year.”

“Yeah,” Will agrees.

“What do you mean ‘used to be’? There are _still_ frequent and loud compliments.” She turns slightly to look at him over her shoulder, her eyes very dark in the low light coming from Will’s bedside lamp. She’s changed, ready for bed, teeth done and everything. He’s hoping to massage her to sleep. Or into a very deep sense of relaxation. He gives her a slight smile. It’s somewhat true. It was true up until last year. But so far this year, nothing much is happening at all. It’s like a switch flipped at New Years on Mackenzie’s sex drive.

“Will,” Mackenzie starts.

“I wasn’t insinuating anything.”

“I know we haven’t –”

“I really wasn’t insinuating anything,” Will repeats, moving his hands out to the muscles of her back.

Mackenzie studies him steadily for a moment. “I feel tired.”

“Should I put the light out?”

“Not yet. And I was talking about us having sex.”

“I know you were, and I still don’t mind. Gives me a chance to rest.”

“For three weeks?”

“Are you counting?”

“Yes,” Mackenzie says. “I like having sex with you. And if I didn’t feel like a heavy blimp, I’d still…”

Will chuckles lightly, an image of a weighted down blimp still trying to float across a football stadium.

Mackenzie gives a wince.

“That wasn’t – wasn’t laughing at you,” Will says softly.

“No, the baby’s attempting a stretch.”

Will shifts his hand to her belly, to feel the baby moving. “Not a lot of room in there for him anymore.”

“Hardly any,” Mackenzie agrees, and she doesn’t sound happy. “Will,” she says, almost a whisper, and he looks over to see if she’s closed her eyes yet. “Can we talk about it?”

“We are,” he says, his tone neutral. He holds her gaze. “I understand things are really not easy for you right now and I’m not complaining about our dry spell –”

“Dry spell?” Mackenzie gives a slight laugh.

Will smiles slightly. “It’s _ok,”_ he stresses. “If you don’t feel like it,” he gives a shrug, and concentrates on her back again. Jesus, how patient was she with him when he was starting on anti-depressants and his sex drive was completely derailed?

“It just feels like such work,” Mackenzie almost whines.

“And you have a baby in –”

“Giant, Nebraskan, mountain man baby,” Mackenzie interjects.

“Pelvis,” Will finishes. “I get that you’re feeling differently about things.”

“Things?”

“Sex,” Will supplies. “Folding laundry. Leaning over the dishwasher. Long walks on the beach.” He pauses while he moves his hands again, using his thumbs this time to use firm pressure in a ‘sweeping out’ manoeuvre. “All of which I understand and don’t really care about. I don’t mind picking up the slack, like I don’t mind that you don’t feel like having sex.”

“Mm,” Mackenzie starts.

“That’s my duty as Dad,” Will finishes.

“I do _want_ to do those things. I just –”

“You’re tired. I get it,” he says lightly.

“I feel a lack of energy,” Mackenzie corrects. “Not interest.”

“You know, we don’t have to have sex,” Will says, going back to her spine and heading further down, to her tailbone. He looks up to meet his wife’s eye. “We can do other things.”

Mackenzie gives him a long, steady expression. “That does sound fun. But not right now.”

“Maybe tomorrow,” Will says lightly, concentrating on her back.

“Maybe.”

“Or Monday, seeing as we’re busy tomorrow now. It’s a day off.” He looks over to find his wife smiling at him.

“It is,” she agrees. “If you don’t mind working after all.”

“I do not,” Will says firmly. “Happy to do all the work.”

Especially if it makes her happy.


	5. Chapter 5

_19 th January 2014_

_Sunday_

_D-Day -6_

 

When Will lived in Tribeca, he used a car service to get to work. And then he and Mackenzie moved to within walking distance of the AWM building (they’re only a mile away – a twenty minute walk), which wasn’t a big deal when Mackenzie wasn’t nine months pregnant. Now, Will would rather she take a car to work than a taxi or walk. Plus, it’s the dead of winter. And she’s nine months pregnant. So his account has become their account and they use it over any other type of transport, to and from work, to and from doctor’s and therapy appointments, out of the city to see Nancy Skinner.

Mackenzie makes small talk with the driver, and Will half listens as he watches the streets change from skyscrapers, trying to make the most of the limited land space, to front yards, and wide city blocks, homes on streets lined with trees, and cars parked occasionally, instead of nose to tail, completely covered in snow. He can imagine kids on the streets and in the yards, tossing a football, riding bikes, shrieking and chasing each other and playing and being free, and he yearns for it for two reasons: he didn’t have a childhood like that at all. And he wants one just like it for his son.

He reaches for his wife’s hand, tugging on her sleeve to be able to retrieve it from her lap and she looks over at him, while the driver tells her about his daughter (Will has no idea, he wasn’t listening in the slightest), and raises her eyebrows, eyes concerned. He probably has that ‘look’ on his face. The mournful one, or the one that makes Mackenzie worry about him, because he’s thinking heavy thoughts, but he gives her a slight smile, and tells her with his eyes that he’ll talk to her about it later. She holds his hand tightly. And then they pull up to the Skinner residence.

It’s actually Charlie and Nancy’s daughter’s house, but Nancy asked them to meet her there, and she answers the door when Will knocks. “Hi,” she greets and Will notices immediately that she looks so much less haunted than she did at the funeral. She actually looks good; at peace. He wishes he was at the same place regarding Charlie’s death, but he spent too much time fucking around, being in denial about being in denial, that Charlie’s death was bothering him.

“Hi,” Will responds as the same time Mackenzie does. He stands aside to let his wife go in first. She and Nancy exchange a kiss on the cheek, and when it’s his turn, he gets a kiss too.

“Thank you so much for coming out to see me,” Nancy says, directing most of that comment to Mackenzie. Her eyes move to the baby bump, exposed to its full glory as Mackenzie removes her winter coat. Will closes the front door behind him and reaches to help his wife remove her outer layer. “You must be nearly due?” Nancy asks Mackenzie, taking the coat from Will and hanging it on the rack by the door.

“Next Saturday is my due date,” she responds. “But I’m sure he’ll be late.”

Will looks up at his wife as he unbuttons his coat and she glances at him. So, it’s ok to tell Nancy the baby’s gender?

“Most first babies are,” Nancy says. “They like to torture us with it.”

Mackenzie laughs lightly.

“Come on through,” Nancy directs. Will quickly hangs his coat with his wife’s and follows them through to a sitting room. He lets Mackenzie pick where she wants to sit, and she chooses one end of a couch, moving the pillows against her back. He sits next to her and Nancy has already taken a seat opposite. “How have you been doing Will?”

He looks over at the other woman, thinks about lying and saying he’s totally fine, and then remembers that he’s trying being open with people, and not just his wife. There is nothing to fear from Nancy Skinner. “It’s been tough,” he says. He feels Mackenzie’s eyes on him and glances at her. She gives him a slight smile.

“I know you loved Charlie dearly,” Nancy says sagely and Will can only nod in response. He did. He really did. And if he admits that now, he very well might break down in tears on the Skinner’s couch. He’s pretty sure he won’t be able to handle that. “I selfishly asked you out here today because I wanted to know you a little better,” Nancy goes on. “Both of you,” she adds, looking to Mackenzie as well. “You were both a big part of Charlie’s life and, well, I miss him.”

“Me too,” Will says, meeting the older woman’s dark eyes. She gives him a tight smile, tinged with sadness, but also hope. He gets it. Keep Charlie alive through them. Which is –  he glances at Mackenzie. “We were actually thinking of naming the baby after him,” he says, and reaches for Mackenzie’s hand, while holding Nancy’s gaze. Her eyes widen at him a little. “Or, using Charlie as a middle name. We can’t really decide,” he glances at his wife, and she smiles, her eyes tinged with sadness too.

“Charlie would have been really honoured by that,” Nancy says. “He’d be really happy for you,” she adds. Will nods, feeling an uncomfortable lumpiness in his throat. Dear God he doesn’t need to cry right now. Not here.   

“Ok, Mom, we’re heading out,” Katie comes in with Ned behind her. She says hello to Mackenzie and Will and they say hello back.

“Ok,” Nancy says to her daughter. “Have a good time,” she says to her grandson. Katie goes to the door.

Ned eyes up Will. “Hello.”

“Hey Ned,” Will greets him. “How are you doing?”

“My Mom’s taking me to see a movie.”

“Nice,” Will says. “What are you seeing?”  
“The Nut Job.”

“That sounds interesting,” Mackenzie responds.

“What’s that about Ned?” Nancy asks.

“It’s about a squirrel who discovers a bank robbery,” the young boy answers. “Are you here to play guitar with Beau?”

“Uh, no,” Will answers. “I came to have lunch with your grandma.”

“Beau said he played guitar with you yesterday.”

“He did.”

“I can play one song,” Ned says, holding up a finger.

“What’s that?” Mackenzie asks.

“Smoke on the Water.”

“Classic,” Mackenzie smiles. “Can you play Smoke on the Water, Will?”

“I can,” he confirms.

“Come on, Ned,” Katie calls from the door.

“Maybe I’ll play with you some time,” Ned offers.

“I’d like that,” Will gives him a smile.

“Bye,” Ned walks out of the room.

“He wants to be able to play like Beau,” Nancy explains.

“I would too,” Mackenzie says. “He’s very good.”

“He is,” Nancy smiles. “Charlie was very proud of him. I think he was happiest that he could tell Beau about his favourite music and he’d go and learn to play it to impress his grandfather.”

Will smiles at that. That sounds like Charlie. For a second, they can hear Ned talking to his mother as they put on coats, and then the door closes behind them and it’s silent again. Will assumes Beau is not here, or is at least, not invited to the movies with them.

“Sorry, Nancy, can you point me to the bathroom?” Mackenzie speaks up.

“Of course,” Nancy gets to her feet. Will does too, to help Mackenzie to hers. The women walk to an intersection of hallways just outside of the living room’s double doors. “Just down there, second on the right,” Nancy directs. Mackenzie thanks her, and heads off, and that leaves Will and Nancy. She comes back to take her seat.

Honest to God, he hates small talk, but he’s ok with being alone with Nancy. “How have you been?” Will asks her.

Nancy gives an almost forced smile. “It’s been hard,” she says and gives a slight shrug. “I miss him terribly.”

“I can only imagine,” Will responds. He can’t fathom what it would be like to lose Mackenzie, and he has actually already lost her once already.

“But it helps being here with my family. I came to stay after Charlie died and haven’t left,” she says, with a smile. “The house doesn’t seem right without him there. Too large and too quiet. Even though he spent all of his time at the office.”

“Yeah,” Will smiles, with a nod.

“I can imagine it’s conflicting for you, being in his office now.”

Will blinks for a second, thrown by the sudden insightfulness. “It took some getting used to,” he says.

“A lot of things changed all at once,” Nancy notes, and Will’s wondering if she’s talking about herself, or about his life. “Charlie worried about you a lot,” Nancy goes on.

“I know,” Will says heavily.

“I think he’d be happy to see you now,” Nancy adds.

And when Will thinks over what happened last year, over all of it, not just Charlie’s death, tears _do_ dot his eyes. He feels like he was walking on a knife’s edge, barely keeping it together. He can imagine Charlie would be relieved that he doesn’t need to worry about Will anymore.

Mackenzie returns and Nancy gets to her feet, heading for the doorway Mackenzie has just come through. “Shall we have lunch? Mackenzie, what can I get you to drink?” 

“I’m fine with water,” she answers, as Nancy walks by her, but she’s looking at Will, her eyebrows up, wondering what’s going on.

Will stands and walks to her. He leans down to give her a kiss. “Talking about Charlie,” he explains and she nods and takes his hand as they follow Nancy to the kitchen.

 

 

**********

 

“This really is very nice,” Mackenzie says of the soup they are eating. Pumpkin. Nancy made it herself. And cheese and oregano en croute.

“Thank you,” Nancy says again. “Please help yourself to more,” she indicates the plate of bread. Will helps himself. They’re good. Nancy asks Mackenzie about the baby, and about her job. They talk about Pruit a little, and how Charlie felt about him. Will asks after the grandchildren, and Nancy expresses her delight that Will invited Beau to play. He misses Charlie a lot, especially their bond over music.

After lunch, Will helps clear the table and stack the dishwasher. He finds it easy being around Nancy and it’s not at all out of place to randomly talk about Charlie, nor is it awkward talking about missing him, or wishing he were still around. Nancy freely discusses her husband, and her regrets, and Will finds that it’s not a burden to share his feelings with her either. His only concern is that he’s cutting Mackenzie out of a lot of the conversation, and he does notice she’s more quiet than usual. She’s probably tired, but he doesn’t want to assume. He doubts that she’d begrudge him this time. But still, he’s aware and so after the kitchen is squared away and he’s thanked Nancy for lunch again, he suggests, tentatively, that they might head home.

Mackenzie gives them a wan smile. “I am due for my afternoon nap.”

Nancy gives her a kind expression. “Of course, but before you go, Will, I have a few of Charlie’s things that I thought you might like to have.” She goes to get them before Will can react. He turns to his wife, who is sitting at the breakfast bar. It’s not as tall as theirs back home.

“What do you think it is?” Mackenzie asks.

“I don’t know. How are you doing?”

“Feeling tired, to be honest,” she says, keeping her voice low.

“I’ll text –”

“Already have,” Mackenzie says. “He’ll text when he’s here.”

Will puts his phone back in his pocket. Of course, she’s way ahead of him.

Nancy returns with a box, which Will immediately goes to relieve her of. She thanks him, even though she claims it isn’t heavy. Will puts it down on the breakfast bar. There are scrapbooks inside. “They’re Charlie’s stories,” Nancy explains. “When he first started in journalism, I kept scrapbooks. But of course, everything is archived and online these days. I didn’t have the heart to throw them out.”

Which means, Will could read all the stories online as well, but that’s not the point. The point is the sentimentality. “Are you sure?” He asks of Nancy.

“Oh yes,” she affirms. “They’ll mean more to you than any of the kids.” She rests her hand on his arm for a moment. “And there might be a little something else in there that I know you and Charlie shared.” She gives him a grin and he returns it, but he’s not sure what she means.

Will spots a photo frame between two of the books and pulls it out. It’s a picture of him and Charlie at a Christmas party. Not work related. It might have been one he and Nancy hosted themselves. Will’s wearing one of those paper crowns that come in Christmas crackers, and they each have whiskey in hand. It was a while ago now, but Will notices he doesn’t look happy. He’s smiling, and his cheeks are red, presumably because he’s been drinking, but there’s something in his eyes that is off. Or maybe he’s just uncomfortable with the level of affection Charlie showed him that night. Will hadn’t been working for him long, but he was already acting like the father figure Will craved. He suddenly feels so very grateful for Charlie Skinner.

“That’s a great photo,” Mackenzie says, looking over his shoulder.

“Yeah, first time I was invited to the Skinner residence,” Will says, giving her the photo to look at.

“And not the last,” Nancy says knowingly. “Charlie said to me later that night that you’d go a long way as a TV anchor.”

Will looks over at Nancy, surprised. “We’d barely met.”

“But he had a feeling,” she says wisely.

Mackenzie’s phone buzzes. “That will be the car,” she says, giving Will back the photo. She checks her phone to confirm. Will puts the frame back in the box. “Thank you so much for inviting us out,” Mackenzie says to Nancy.

“Don’t be strangers,” Nancy says, moving forward to give Mackenzie a hug. “Once your little one is here, I’d like to meet him.”

“We’ll make sure,” Mackenzie says, her eyes glancing to Will. He hefts the box in his arm and they head for the door. He puts it down to help Mackenzie into her coat and then puts his on.

“Come here,” Nancy says, her arms open to give him a hug too. He gives her a squeeze. He doesn’t know if they will be here often, and suspects not, but they share something important in common and he doesn’t want to lose touch with her either. She’s his gateway to the world of Charlie. The rest of the world will move on; work has already changed. But he can always come here to talk about Charlie Skinner.


	6. Chapter 6

“Nancy’s a good woman,” Mackenzie says sleepily, while Will discovers that that ‘special’ thing he shared with Charlie is a very old bottle of whiskey. Yeah, he remembers this. Charlie would only bring it out when Will was actually at his house and they’d sit and brood and talk about politics. He said he smuggled it back from Viet Nam, but Will doesn’t know if that’s really true.

“She is,” Will answers, tucking the bottle back into the corner and bracing it with the scrapbooks, like he found it. He looks over at his wife, who has her eyes closed, head tilted to the side. He reaches out his arm, drawing her closer against his body, so she doesn’t have to stretch her neck. She gives a sigh and snuggles against him, her hand resting around the curve at the top of his thigh. Will expects Mackenzie to go to sleep, but he can see her eyelashes, if not her eyes, and they periodically blink. Will looks at the houses as they drive past, and he thinks again that this might be a nice place for them to raise their family.

When they get home, Will puts Charlie’s box down by the front door to help Mackenzie with her coat. He thinks she can probably manage just fine, but still, he likes to be attentive in case she does need help. He hooks it for her and she heads through to the bedroom, saying she wants to lay down. He whips his coat off and picks up the box again, following his wife. She’s on the bed, facing the bathroom, eyes closed, but when he comes in, she opens them again. “What else is in the box?”

Will walks around to his side of the bed and sits, putting the box on the mattress in front of him. Besides the booze, scrapbooks and photo, there’s one of Charlie’s ties. The dark blue and red paisley one.

“He wore that when he came to see me in DC,” Mackenzie says.

Will looks over. She’s half turned to see him. She meets his eyes. “I didn’t know that.”

“Why would anyone mention what tie he was wearing?”

“I meant, that he – when did he got to see you in DC?”

“When he offered me News Night.”

“He did that in person?” Will asks, surprised. “I thought he would have just called you.”

“I guess he was serious.”

Will fingers the tie and puts it back in the box. It’s the tie he wore on Mackenzie’s first day too, though he doubts that it would have been deliberate. “Did you take convincing?” Will asks his wife.

Mackenzie gives him a steady gaze. “I had some concerns.”

Will gets up to put the box on top of his dresser, opposite the bed. There’s nothing in the drawers, but it’s handy to put things on top of, like his watch, and his phone sometimes. Will turns back to the bed. “About me?”

“Yeah.”

Will sits on the mattress, then swings his legs around so he can lay down flat. Well, she wasn’t wrong to have concerns. He’s thinking of something to say to that when Mackenzie changes the subject.

“What were you thinking about in the car?”

He turns his head, but she’s facing the wall again.

“On the way to the Skinner’s?” Mackenzie prompts.

“Yeah,” Will says. “I was thinking about how it looked like a nice neighbourhood.”

“Mm,” Mackenzie agrees.

“And that our kids could be really happy there.”

Mackenzie moves, so she’s half turned over, to look at him. Frown at him. “Our kids?”

Will gives a shrug of his mouth. “Sure.”

“You want to have more than one kid?”

Maybe he doesn’t?

“Sure?” He says, unsure now.

“We haven’t even had this one,” Mackenzie gripes. “You maybe want to think about that before you dial up the next?”

“I wasn’t –”

“I’m sorry, I’m feeling grumpy,” she cuts him off. “You know what? I actually get what you mean when you say socialising is tiring. I mean, you’re always ‘on’ and having to concentrate on the conversation, and thinking of something to say next, and you can’t fall asleep on the couch.”

Will chuckles at the last one. He picks himself up to move closer to her, and they finally have eye contact.

“Do you think I’m turning into an introvert?” Mackenzie asks.

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” Will moves his hand to her lower back, pressing his fingers against her spine. She gives a whimper. “But yeah, that’s what’s tiring about socialising.”

“Hang on,” Mackenzie turns further, trapping his hand against the mattress. “You want to move?”

Will blinks at her.

“You’ve mentioned it a few times now. You want to move to the suburbs?” Her tone has an edge to it.

“Uh.”

“We just moved here. I’m about to give _birth._ ”

“I wasn’t suggesting we move this weekend,” Will says, freeing his hand. Mackenzie turns further, her eyes dark and accusatory. “But I think we should consider it.”

“What’s to consider?” Mackenzie asks sharply.

Will feels bewildered by her tone. And it must show on his face, because she’s apologetic, again, a second later. “Let’s talk about it another time,” Will suggests, wondering if they will, and if he’ll have the heart to bring it up again if she does not.

“No,” Mackenzie counters, starting to turn over completely.

“What are you doing?” Will asks, moving out of her way.

“I can’t talk to you with my back to you,” she says, and settles on her other side, facing him. Will stays where he is, leaning on an elbow. “Tell me why you want to move.”

“We can talk about it later,” he tries again.

“No really,” Mackenzie reaches out a hand to his arm. She gives him an encouraging expression. “I’m just tired, but I’m listening. We’re talking. I swear I’ll keep the bitchy tone under control. Tell me why.”

Will waits a beat, gives them a chance to settle a little. “Well,” he starts tentatively. “We can’t raise a kid in a box.”

“And by that you mean the apartment is too small?”

“Yeah. We need a yard and a street where he can ride his bike and play with the other kids.”

“We have a street. And there’s a park across the road,” Mackenzie points out. “Where plenty of children play every day, including all the kids around here, probably.”

Well, she does have a point about that.

“If we don’t live in the city, we’ll have to commute to work. That adds time that we won’t get to spend with Charlie anyway.”

Will looks at her sharply, but she doesn’t seem to have noticed she just referred to their baby as Charlie.

“And we’d probably have to definitely get a nanny, because that would – especially when he starts school, because how are we going to be there for him before and after? I won’t be able to.”

Ok, when she puts it like that.

“There are great schools in Manhattan,” Will says.

“Then we may as well live in the city,” Mackenzie says desperately.

Will moves so he’s laying down again. It’s just a conversation, but she’s clearly against it. Very against it. And he doesn’t know how he feels about that. Not great, to be shot down so easily. “I thought it might be nice,” he says, almost petulantly.

Mackenzie’s hand finds its way to his shoulder. “You’re right, it could be – I’m sorry to be so… negative. I don’t mean to be. I think I’m just tired.”

“Have a nap,” Will suggests, and looks over at her. She does look tired, but she also looks sorry. “It’s ok,” he says, moving to his side so he can face her. “We don’t have to decide right now whether we’ll stay or go.”

“I do think there’s a chance the apartment might be too small. Especially when he’s older. And definitely if we have more kids.” She attempts a wan smile.

 _There’s_ a little compromise.

“You could see if there are houses in the city that would suit your yard needs.”

Will gives a slight chuckle. And that’s her _trying_. Fixing the rupture. He leans forward to kiss her softly. Her hand lands on his cheek, keeping him there for a moment, kissing him again.

“Sorry for a crap reaction.”

Will pulls away to see her eyes. “It’s ok.”

“It’s not ok, and you don’t have to pretend.”

He gives a slight smile to that, but he’s not going to verbally agree with her. He’s never going to tell her she’s a shit person; he doesn’t believe it to be true. “I’ll talk to a realtor.”

“Just to see,” Mackenzie hints.

“Just to see,” he agrees.

“Will?”

“Yes?”

“Can you put my socks back on? My feet are cold.”

He pushes himself to sit up. Her feet are bare. “Why do you take them off?” He gets up and walks around the mattress to find her socks on the floor.

“My feet get hot,” Mackenzie whines.

Will stoops to pick her socks up, and then takes hold of a foot to put a sock on it. It _is_ cold to the touch. Mackenzie waves her other foot at him, and he tickles his fingers on the underside of it. Mackenzie squirms hard, on the bed, looking over at him with a happy expression. Will dons the other sock and pushes her foot away. “Thank you,” she says sweetly, and reaches up to him with her left hand. She’s half turned over to look at him, now he’s at her back again. “Come lay with me.”

Will takes her hand for a second, but goes to move around the bed again.

“No, on this side,” Mackenzie directs. “Come cuddle me.”

Will moves along the mattress to lie at her back, draping an arm over her side and mashing it between her breasts and the baby. Given how big she is, it is difficult to get body to body with her, but it’s possible, spooned up against her back. Mackenzie places her hand over his arm and gives a content sigh. Will presses a kiss to her bare shoulder, because she’s shed other layers on coming into the bedroom as well. He’s pretty sure she’ll complain that he’s made her too hot in about five seconds, but he’ll stay as long as he can get.

“I really am sorry for being an arse about you wanting to move.”

“It’s ok honey,” Will says, closing his eyes, and nudging his nose into her hair to get the tickly strands off his face. “We’ll focus on _having_ the baby before we think about moving somewhere else to _raise_ the baby.”

“Seems like a fair compromise.”

She smells nice. And he likes the feeling of the weight of her breasts resting against his arm. So Charlie went to see her in person, to convince her to take the News Night job. Will didn’t know that. But that’s the kind of respect Mackenzie deserves. Will feels himself start to drift off to sleep. It’s strange to think of Mackenzie and Charlie meeting without Will knowing. Not that he knows all of his wife’s business, or all the business of his best friend. And he can see why Charlie didn’t mention he was going to go and meet Mackenzie. That makes total sense, considering how things were back then. He hadn’t seen or spoken to Mackenzie in three years. Her emails had slowed to a sporadic once a month and he hadn’t responded to a single one.

And Will thinks, Charlie didn’t just move the pawns for News Night. He manipulated him and Mackenzie back together again. Will wonders if he knew it would lead to marriage and babies, or if he just hoped. And Will wonders why it is that everyone else seems to know what he needs more than he does. Mackenzie doesn’t think living in the suburbs is a good idea? She’s probably right. It makes sense, to be close to work and close to their son. But that doesn’t mean he can’t have a yard.

And she didn’t totally say no to the idea of having another baby.


	7. Chapter 7

_20 th January 2014_

_Monday_

_D-Day -5_

God bless public holidays, for they create long weekends, and this weekend is a long weekend. It also means Mackenzie’s last week at work will be short, and although she’s loath to admit it, she’ll be glad to be finished. She’s tired, and she has a very large baby in her rather small body. Katherine assures her the baby will be able to get out ok, as in, his head isn’t so big it will get stuck in her pelvis (she had a scan to make sure), but still, he feels like a giant, and she is only little. If he does get stuck, they’ll do an emergency caesarean, which doesn’t bear thinking about, beyond knowing it’s a possibility, because it freaks her out a little.

It freaks her out a lot.

What if she’s no good at giving birth? She hasn’t done it before. What if she does something wrong? Or she’s not strong enough to get him out? What if she needs the epidural? What if she’s in labour for three days? It could happen. She doesn’t think she has the mental capacity to deal with that. Or the physical reserves. Maybe she shouldn’t be working this week at all, to save her energy. But what’s she going to do at home? Will and his hyper efficiency means everything is done and ready. Bags are packed, the nursery is set up, birth plans are in place. They’re just waiting on the baby. But she’s four days from her due date. And he’s probably going to be late, which means she has longer to wait. Maybe they _should_ go house-hunting. That would distract her completely.

If she had the energy for it.

Mackenzie pushes herself up on an elbow slightly to see the clock on Will’s nightstand. Shit, it’s only seven thirty. She nudges her husband anyway. He doesn’t seem to have noticed, so she shoves him harder.

“Huh?”

“I need you.”

“What’s?” He starts to move and she can see him turning over to face her, trying to look at her. The only light in the room is from the nightlight on in the bathroom, that spills in through a crack in the door. Enough for her to be able to get to the other room without walking into furniture. “What’s happening?” Will moves closer to her.

“I’m thinking too much,” she holds open her arm and he falls in against her. Literally, falls, but mostly onto the mattress. Then he wiggles closer so he’s within her embrace, angled away from her belly, but his nose against her neck, and an arm over her back. He’s warm and sleepy, and smells familiar and comforting. The weight of him is heavy, but not crushing, and she already feels a little more grounded than she did a moment ago.

“What can I do?” He murmurs, his voice a rumble against her throat.

“This is helping,” she says meekly, and suddenly feels like crying. “I’m thinking about having to give birth.”

“Is something happening?” Will asks, sounding so very much more alert all of a sudden.

“No,” Mackenzie whispers. “But it will.”

“Yeah,” Will agrees. “It’ll be ok.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I’ll be right there bailing out water as much as I can.”

For a second, Mackenzie doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about. But then she remembers the boat analogy he fed her the night of Charlie’s funeral. The day she found out she was pregnant, and was taking over as news director for Atlantis Cable News. What a day! And it feels like so long ago. An entire other lifetime. But really it was only seven months past. It hasn’t been a year since all of that changed. It’s been a hellish seven months, in places, but to be fair, also incredibly wonderful. 

Given the way Will’s been the last seven months, she thinks he’d give birth for her if he could. Or do everything else but.

“I’d never let you go under,” Will says.

Tears leap to her eyes and tickle her nose.

He pulls back to look at her, his eyes bleary in the semi-darkness and his hair sticking up. She reaches up to comb it back into place and is suddenly struck with the idea that she’ll be doing that for her son one day soon, combing his hair into place, and she can picture doing it when he’s three and five and fifteen.

“Are you ok?” Will asks gently.

“Yes,” Mackenzie gives a sob/laugh. “I’m feeling overwhelmed and anxious and –” She stops. All of it. She’s feeling all of it.

“You know what you need?” Will asks softly.

“What?” Mackenzie asks meekly.

“Tea.”

Mackenzie laughs again.

“And maybe a little toast,” Will says wisely.

“Ok, tea, that sounds good,” Mackenzie agrees.

“To start,” Will says. “Then we can move on to stage two.” He shifts to get out of bed, adjusting his pyjama bottoms around his groin as he starts to walk around the bed.

“What’s stage two?” Mackenzie asks, before he’s out of the range of her vision. But he doesn’t answer her. She hears him leave the bedroom, wondering what stage two is.

 

 

**********

 

Tea is not a bad place to start. He gets points for that. But mostly, it’s just the gentle nature of the morning. Hot tea and warm toast and sitting in bed with a million pillows, in their dark bedroom, not talking, just being with each other. It’s the gentleness of just being that settles her mind a little. She can still think, and she does, but she doesn’t feel panicked. Will’s right there. He won’t let anything happen to her. She trusts in that.

“What’s stage two?” She finally asks, her tea warming her chest, and the plate of toast empty between them on the mattress.

“There are a few options,” Will responds, sipping his coffee. “A walk in the park. Or a bath? Or I could read to you.”

“You’re going to read to me?” Mackenzie asks, surprised.

“I _could_ read to you,” Will corrects.

“I do like listening to your voice,” she says listlessly. She sips her tea. It’s apple. By sheer cellular memory, she can taste cinnamon. “What would you read to me?”

“Poetry by the world’s most romantic writers, or,” he leans over to his nightstand, to get something from the bottom cubby. His shirt rides up, and she can see the dimple of his ass. It’s a nice ass. Will straightens up again. “Baby names.”

Mackenzie gives him a frown. “I’ll take the poetry.”

“This could be music to your ears.”

“We’ve been through the lists!” Mackenzie whines a little, but it’s half hearted.

“We’re going to start with zee,” Will tells her, putting his coffee on his nightstand, to open the book, right at the back. “Because we always start with A and get to about E before we’re bored.”

Mackenzie laughs a little at that. “It’s true,” she muses.

“All right,” Will sighs, and prepares to read aloud.

“Wait,” Mackenzie stops him.

He looks over at her, perplexed.

“We should get the list.”

“Good idea,” he says, and gives her the book.

 

 

**********

 

Will lies with his head pillowed on Mackenzie’s bicep. She’s combing his hair, absently scratching her fingernails against his scalp. From here, all he can see is breast, a vast mountain range of it, in front of his eyes. Mackenzie presses a kiss to the side of his head and he feels a soft edge of the baby, something more like a knee, or maybe a backside. He can’t move around in there much, and he’s dropped for the birth (Mackenzie thinks so; said it was easier to breathe), so there’s nowhere much to go.

“I do feel better,” Mackenzie says.

“That’s good,” Will rubs her stomach.

“I think I will take a bath.”

“Ok.”

“But not right now.”

“You let me know when you’re ready.”

“I’m really glad we finally agreed on some names,” Mackenzie chuckles. Three names.

“Me too.”

“At least for now. I’m sure we’ll probably change our minds again.”

“And that’s ok,” Will says.

His phone buzzes on this nightstand. He doesn’t move to get it.

“Who’s that?” Mackenzie asks.

“Dunno.”

“If I’m here, who’s texting you?”

“My other much younger girlfriend.”

Mackenzie smacks the top of his head lightly.

“Hey!” Will complains softly.

“It’s probably Gideon,” Mackenzie answers herself.

“Probably,” Will agrees.

“Go see what he says.”

“We’re cudd – you’re supposed to be relaxing, not worrying about what Gideon’s texting.”

“What if Debbie’s gone into labour? Or had the baby?” Mackenzie asks excitedly.

Will gives a groan, but he gets up and leans over to retrieve his phone. There’s that cute little ass dimple again. He reads the message, and then types something back. He lies down again, slipping his phone under his pillow.

“Well?” Mackenzie prompts.

“Hm?” Will asks innocently.

“What did he say? God you’re annoying!”

“He’s complaining there’s no sign of labour.”

“When was she due?”

“Today.”

“Hm,” Mackenzie says.

“You heard from anyone else?”

“No.”

Will’s phone buzzes again. He picks it up and checks the message. “He says Debbi’s asking after you.”

“Tell her good luck.”

Will does that and puts his phone back under his pillow. He gives a sigh. “Well, it’s two o’clock and we’re still in pyjamas.”

“You want to have that bath now?” Mackenzie asks, on a slight laugh.

“Shall we? Pretend we’re somewhat respectable.” Will sits.

“Speak for yourself,” Mackenzie responds. “I’m always respectable.”

 

 

**********

 

“I love this bath,” Mackenzie says dreamily. She’s mostly buoyant in the water, though she does lean back against Will’s chest, and her ponytail tickles his nose. He silently reaches for the body wash. It will make a nice lubricant while she rubs her shoulders. He’d probably have the water a little hotter, but he doesn’t want his wife to black out on him from heat exhaustion. Her skin is hot against his, and he doesn’t mind sucking it up for a little while.

“Lean forward a moment?” He requests and Mackenzie complies, gripping the edge of the tub to leverage herself. Will places his hands on her shoulders, rubbing his thumbs gently into her muscles.

“Oh god!” Mackenzie enthuses. “I love you too.”

Will smiles to himself. “More than the bath?”

“Definitely more than the bath,” Mackenzie groans, rolling her neck to the side. Will takes a hint and moves to the exposed skin. She gives a hum of appreciation.

“That’s good to hear,” Will murmurs. Mackenzie shifts a hand to his thigh and squeezes a little. “I love you too,” he adds, right by her ear, and then places a kiss there, catching the edge of her smile as it blooms over her face.

“So is this stage three?” Mackenzie asks, sounding a little breathless as he uses even pressure in his fingers and thumbs to smooth her muscles.

“Sure,” Will agrees. He lost count. He works her shoulders and neck, moving down her back as far as he can reach, then dares to move around the front, stroking over the baby, massaging what’s left of the body wash into her taught skin. He moves up her ribs, and when she doesn’t flinch, or shove his hands away, gently massages her breasts a little (something for him), before roving back to her abdomen, and then curving around to her lower back.

Why do they make bath products smell so delicious? He’s really craving passionfruit and vanilla now. Maybe pana cotta? Or a brulee. Or cheesecake. He’s pretty sure he could find passionfruit and vanilla cheesecake in a supermarket somewhere. So long as they deliver to their home, because he can’t be bothered leaving the apartment today.

“What’s stage four?” Mackenzie asks, her voice tight and Will blinks back to reality. Her hand is tight on his thigh and she’s breathing more quickly.

“What would you like stage four to be?” He asks, leaning forward so he can drip the words right in her ear.

Mackenzie kind of twitches, and he can fell from the new kind of tension in her body that she’s –

“Completely turned on right now,” Mackenzie blurts out desperately.

Will shifts his right hand around her, back over her hip, and trails fingers along the inside of her thigh. She grips his leg tighter. He moves the hand further and she jumps, smashing her other hand into the water so hard she sprays herself in the face.

Will grins.


	8. Chapter 8

_21 st January 2014_

_Tuesday_

_D-Day -4_

 

“Yeah, you’re definitely dilated,” Katherine says from between Mackenzie’s legs. Mackenzie holds her breath until the doctor vacates down there. She draws her knees together for some dignity, though at this point, with all the tests and checks, there is little point trying to hide anything. Katherina has seen it all. And Mackenzie hasn’t even given birth yet. Katherine gives her a slight smile. “He’ll be along soon.”

“You can’t say exactly when though? I mean,” Mackenzie laughs lightly. “I know you can’t say exactly _when,_ but, the day or can you say this week?”

“I really can’t,” Katherine says kindly. “But soon.” She strips off her gloves and tosses them in the bin. Mackenzie moves to put her clothes back on, and then joins her doctor back at the desk. “Anything else going on?”

Mackenzie shakes her head.

“Have you finished work yet?”

“Not yet. At the end of this week. But I’m taking it easy.”

“That’s good. Make sure you get plenty of sleep and try to cut back on your workload if you can.”

Mackenzie nods. She’s heard all of this for the last three weeks, since she was a month out from her due date and started seeing her doctor weekly. The elusive due date. It feels like a mythical character at this point. She feels like she’s caught in the world’s longest pregnancy, and feels a little panicky when she thinks about the fact that she’ll probably be overdue. She could be two weeks away from giving birth. She’s ready now.

“Ok, well everything looks good,” Katherine sums up, finishing adding her notes to Mackenzie’s computerised file. “Do you have any other questions?”

“No thank you,” Mackenzie declines politely.

She leaves, texting Will from the back of the car service to say that everything with the baby is fine. She was right, he has dropped into position, her cervix is dilating, things are happening, but no one can say when. Will doesn’t answer her straight away, so he must be busy. Just as Mackenzie’s elevator is closing in the lobby, she hears someone call out to ask her to hold it. She jabs the open door button quickly and as the doors peel back again, Leona Lansing comes into view, stepping quickly towards her. “Well look at you, Mrs McAvoy,” Leona says, breezing into the elevator car. Mackenzie gives a slightly embarrassed laugh (she’s still not used to hearing that). “You’re looking great. When are you due?”

“Saturday,” Mackenzie responds. “Which floor?”

“Forty-four,” Leona answers her. “You’re working right up?”

“I am,” Mackenzie jabs the button.

“Good on you.”

Mackenzie turns back to her surprised, as the doors slide shut.

“How are things going with Pruit?”

“Oh well,” Mackenzie hedges, as they start moving. “Not so bad.”

“I heard you twisted his arm into spending a day in the newsroom.”

Mackenzie looks at her with wide eyes.

“I have spies everywhere,” Leona answers mightily. “Good on you. It’d do that little twerp some good to get his hands dirty.”

“He just shadowed me,” Mackenzie explains.

“Next time, have him on hold with the White House for an hour trying to get a statement from them,” Leona says.

Mackenzie smiles. It did cross her mind. “I never did thank you for getting me this job.”

“You got yourself the job, because you were the most qualified and experienced person for it, after Charlie Skinner,” Leona says back. “Pruit just needed a little help in seeing that. He needs to be told what’s good for him. Like most children.”

Mackenzie wonders if, given the chance, the Lansing’s would buy the network back. “You still have an office in the building?” She asks instead.

“I do,” Leona says brightly. “It’s still my building.”

The elevator slows to the twenty-first floor and the doors open.

“It was nice to see you again,” Mackenzie says as she starts to move out.

“You take care McMac,” Leona says sincerely.

Mackenzie gives her a slight smile and walks into someone she didn’t see. “Oh I’m so sorry!” She exclaims as the woman stumbles. She’d attempt to help her regain her balance, but Mackenzie hardly has a handle on her own these days.

“I’m sorry,” the woman apologises herself.

“I was distracted,” Mackenzie explains.

“It’s fine,” the woman responds. She eyes Mackenzie’s pregnant belly and then meets her eye and gives a smile of reassurance. “Are you ok?”

“Yeah I’m fine,” Mackenzie assures as well, she starts to turn away when the woman calls her back.   
“Could you help me? I’m looking for Grady Buchanan’s office.”

Mackenzie raises her eyebrows for a moment. “Sure, yeah, it’s just down there to the left.”

“Thank you,” the woman says, looking relieved. “I tried calling him but got no answer.”

“Oh,” Mackenzie nods. She has no explanation for that. “Sorry, are you, Grady’s wife?”

The woman laughs a little, “No, his sister.”

“Marissa?”

She blinks at Mackenzie, surprised. “Yes.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Mackenzie offers a hand. “You dated my husband.”

The surprise gets bigger.

“Will. McAvoy,” Mackenzie adds.

“Oh Will,” Marissa says slowly, looking uncomfortable. “That was a long time ago.”

“Oh yeah, I know,” Mackenzie dismisses loudly. “I just found out.”

“Oh,” Marissa says looking uncomfortable.

“It’s fine,” Mackenzie says, on an awkward laugh. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

“Yeah,” Marissa agrees. “I should probably –” She gestures to where Mackenzie indicated her brother’s office is.

“Oh yeah, totally,” Mackenzie agrees, waving her hand in dismissal. Marissa walks away quickly and Mackenzie watches her for a moment, before going back to her office.

 

**I just met Marissa**

**Buchanan. She’s**

**beautiful.**

 

 

Will texts her back right away:

**That’s great about the baby.**

**And what? How?**

 

**She must have come in to**

**see Grady. Tall. Great legs. I**

**can see why you like her.**

**I haven’t seen her in a long time.**

**I’ll come up to say hi.**

**Are you fucking kidding me right**

**now? I’m about to have your baby**

**and you want to catch up with an**

**old flame? Who you were going to**

**marry?**

**I see you’re not in the mood for**

**joking. It was liked – past tense.**

**I only have eyes for you now**

**and forever, until I die. Until I DIE**

**Mac. I love you xxx**

She feels marginally better after that, but still.

 

**You have serious making**

**up to do. Just so you know.**

**I’ll do anything.**

 

 

**********

 

“I find myself in a terrible position,” Mackenzie says as she goes into Will’s office. The door is open and he’s at his desk, checking something on his computer. He gets up immediately, when she arrives.

“What position is that?” He asks cautiously, and plants a perfunctory kiss on the side of her head. He steps back a bit and Mackenzie frowns.

“The position of the unreasonable wife.”

Will raises his eyebrows at her.

“Will you accept that I’m over tired and very pregnant by way of explanation for my offensive behaviour earlier?” She squints at him.

“Uh, are you talking about the texts? And of course, I don’t care.”

“I care.”

“Ok, well, it’s fine.”

“It’s not fine, not really, and you shouldn’t pretend.”

“Ok,” Will steps forward again, and puts his arms to her elbows, dipping his knees a little so he can look her in the eye. “Then I’ll go with, of course I understand you’re tired and very pregnant and that you’re feeling not your usual self.”

Mackenzie blinks at him. “Is that your way of forgiving me?”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” Will says and leans down to give her a soft kiss.

Mackenzie gives a heavy sigh.

“Maybe you should head home after dinner?” Will suggests gently. “Take a bath? Put your feet up?”

Mackenzie studies him a moment and then goes to sit at the table. Will follows her more slowly, unsure if she’s going to answer him, or ignore his suggestion. Mackenzie continues to study him while he sorts out their dinner. Shaking out cold French fries onto their plates. He doesn’t want her to be eating too much greasy food, not when she gets heartburn. “Maybe I should,” Mackenzie says meekly.

Will looks over at her. “You don’t have to wait up for me.”

“You know that I’m going to.”

Well, at least he got her to go home early.


	9. Chapter 9

_22 nd January 2014_

_Wednesday_

_D-Day -3_

 

“I think it’s going to be the longest week,” Will says.

“Why do you say that?”

“It’s Wednesday and Mackenzie’s gotten crazy.”

Habib tries to hide a smile. “What do you mean by ‘crazy’?”

“Baby crazy, I think,” Will answers, sitting back in his chair, crossing his left leg over his right knee.

“She’s due on Saturday?”

“Yeah.”

“And she’s finishing work on Friday?”

“Yeah.”

Habib nods.

“Words of advice?”

Habib shakes his head slightly, that genial smile on his face. “You know what to do, Will. You don’t need me to tell you. You don’t really even need Mackenzie to tell you.”

Will considers that with a pout of his mouth. It might be true. He’s been doing pretty well the last few months with keeping himself and his life on an even keel. He’s been a good husband, and a good boss, and a good friend. He thinks so anyway, and Mackenzie doesn’t really complain about him, she’s just gotten a little nutty.

Two days to go. He wonders what she’s going to do at home by herself. That is, if he ends up going to work next Monday because she hasn’t had the baby yet.

“Actually, it’s a good point,” Habib goes on, bringing Will out of his daydream.

He raises his eyebrows at his therapist. “What’s a good point?”

“You don’t really need me anymore.”

Will blinks at him. “What?”

Habib gives him a calculated tilt of his head. “You’ve been doing great in the last month. Things with Mackenzie are great. You’re about to have a baby.”

“Isn’t that a great reason to come to therapy?”

Habib chuckles, but Will wasn’t trying to be funny. “I was meaning that you’ll have your hands full for… probably a couple of months.”

Will feels his stomach tighten. “Are you suggesting I stop coming?”

“I was going to suggest we could cut back our sessions.”

“To when – how many? Do you want to cut?”

“It’s what you want Will. You don’t have to do anything now, but you could think about it.”

“But you think that I should?”

“I think that you’re ready.”

Will considers that a moment. It feels heavy, like it’s a really big thing. Habib gives him a steady but open expression. “I don’t know what to say,” Will admits.

“You don’t have to say anything,” Habib offers kindly. “Think about it. We’ll talk about it some time.”

“I guess it was going to happen eventually,” Will muses.

“That has been the long-term goal.”

Will considers that.

“You don’t have to quit coming, just cut back. You can come as little or as much as you need, but I feel like you maybe don’t need it as much as you used to.”

Will looks at his therapist, gently encouraging him to believe he’ll be just fine on his own, and wonders at how far he’s come in the last year. “I trust you,” Will says. “If you think I’m ready.”

“I do,” Habib says with a smile. “What do you think?”

“I think it would be weird.”

“Weird?” Habib asks, eyebrows raised.

“To not come next Wednesday.”

“You didn’t come for about three years.”

Will laughs and Habib chuckles.

Ah yes, how things have changed.

“What do you think Mackenzie would say if you didn’t come next week?”

“She might wonder why I’m still at home,” Will quips first. Then he gives a slight shrug. “I’m not sure. She would be supportive but I think a part of her would be wary.”

“Because?”

“Because she wants me to be ‘fixed’ even though she knows that it may not work out that way.”

Habib nods. “She’s hopeful for you.”

“Yeah,” Will agrees. She is.

 

 

**********

 

He has to admit, when Mackenzie meets him for dinner, he feels a little wary. He’s not sure what kind of mood she’s in, and this week hasn’t been great. Two days in, and it hasn’t been great, so she doesn’t really need him aggravating her further. He got beef chow mein for dinner. Chicken for him. Mackenzie thanks him softly as she takes her seat at the table and makes a start. Will watches her a moment, has he starts on his food. He wants to tell her he’s not going to see Habib next week, but he’s honestly waiting to gage how she’s feeling before he brings it up. That’s not a great place to be in.

“You ok?” He asks.

Mackenzie looks over at him, and she looks tired. “Yeah. I’m really feeling it this week.”

Will nods thoughtfully. He wants to tell her to not go in tomorrow. Just call it quits now. She’s obviously struggling, and he really doubts Pruit would stop her. But that’s not the point is it? “Can I do something for you?” He asks.

Mackenzie looks over at him again, chewing. “I don’t know.”

“Are you going to head home early tonight?”

“Definitely.”

Will nods. Good. Ok, that’s good. “Could I entice you with a back rub when I get home?”

“You definitely could,” Mackenzie says with a slight smile.

“How was your day?” Will asks.

“Long.”

“When is Minahan coming up from DC?”

“Monday.”

Will nods. He focuses on his dinner. Maybe she’s not very talkative right now. That’s ok. He doesn’t mind the silence.

“Will?”

“Yeah?” He looks over at his wife.

“Am I being terrible this week?”

“No, honey, you’re getting through the best way you know how.”

“I feel like I’m taking it out on you. I swear, five minutes ago, upstairs, I was totally fine, and then I get here and all I want to do is pick at you.”

Will stares at her, a little surprised. He was getting a ‘tone’?

“Which is totally unfair,” Mackenzie adds. “You haven’t done anything but be your usual sweet self.”

Will blinks.

“I feel like I’ve been on my best behaviour all day and now I don’t have to pretend anymore,” she looks a little stricken.

Will nods. “That’s ok. I don’t mind being your punching bag.”

Tears fill up in Mackenzie’s eyes. “I kind of do.”

“I really don’t,” Will leans forward so they’re closer, more intimate. “I’m your safe haven. No matter what, I’ll always forgive you. So if you need to have a rant about how tired you are or fed up or something some stupid fucking moron did, then I’m happy to listen.”

Mackenzie’s eyes soften on his. “I still feel strongly that I should just not say much until I get home.”

Will nods. “That’s ok.” He’ll talk to her about Habib at home.

 

 

**********

 

Will unlocks the apartment and goes in, moving deliberately so he doesn’t knock something, or crash into something and make excessive noise. He turns and closes the door carefully, then puts his keys on the hook and leaves his bag by the table. He pads in his shoes to the living room, but Mackenzie isn’t there. He sits on the couch and takes his shoes off, then carries them to the bedroom. There’s light coming through the wide open door but when he goes in, Mackenzie has her eyes closed, and her phone loosely in a hand. She text him as soon as the show went down to say she was waiting for him. He might have hurried home a little.

Will goes to the walk in robe and puts his shoes away, and then goes back through the bedroom on his way to the living room. He’ll sit up for a bit before going to sleep himself, and he’ll leave Mackenzie so she gets a good block of sleep, instead of a thirty minute nap. He pulls the bedroom door behind him, so it’s almost closed and as he walks away he wonders if he should have turned her light out? Or taken her phone? He didn’t want to disturb her. She sleeps so lightly these days.

He goes to the living room, shutting the door on his way to increase sound barriers, and picks up his acoustic guitar. He’ll have to find a new home for the guitars. They were going to go in the guest room. But since they converted that to the nursery, they’ve been in the living room. And with the baby growing up and being mobile, he might have to keep them in the master bedroom; there’s plenty of room. Or maybe in the walk in robe. He doesn’t want them to get destroyed. They’re precious to him in their own ways.

Will sits on the couch and puts his feet up on the coffee table. He puts the TV on, mutes the sound, and fits his fingers over the strings, starting with a G chord. He strums softly with the pad of his thumb. He stops to change the channel to ESPN. The Superbowl will be coming up in a few weeks. Seahawks and Broncos. He wonders what he’ll be doing that weekend. Being a Dad, or still waiting? He starts playing ‘You Better, You Bet’. It’s not their official song (he doesn’t know if they have one) but it reminds him of Mackenzie. He gets where she’s coming from, not knowing _when_ is tough to deal with. But he doesn’t have to physically lug around the baby inside him, so he’s not _quite_ where Mackenzie is. He gets that she’s tired and frustrated.

Maybe he should be learning some children’s songs. What do kids sing? Will honestly has no idea. He is way, way, out of touch. Oh ok, Baa Baa Black Sheep. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. And Twinkle Twinkle is the same tune to the ABC’s song. That one he can figure out on his own, but he’s going to have to use Google to get other ideas. What did he sing as a kid? He can’t remember. He doesn’t remember a lot of frivolous joy in his childhood.

He wonders if one day he’ll teach his son how to play. He wonders if his son will be any good. He wonders if his son will inherit his mother’s tone deafness. He wonders if his son would want to learn.

Will stops to check his phone. There’s no message from Gideon, so either nothing’s happening or something’s happening and he’s too busy to text. Will thinks about texting him to ask, but then figures, his friend will let him know when there’s something to report. Will goes back to playing, switching to Elvis, humming the tune while ESPN sports shows statistics of players for the big game.

“Sounds good,” comes from the doorway and Will jumps, his fingers slipping over the strings, to make a stretched vinyl sound. He knocks the remote to the floor and Mackenzie laughs lightly as she comes into the room. “Don’t stop on my account.”

“Jesus,” Will hisses. He leans forward to pick the remote up, and puts it on the table, as his wife comes to sit next to him. “Did I wake you?”

“No. Not really, but it was nice to wake up to.” She leans forward to give him a kiss. He can feel her cheeks are warm and she smells sleepy. “I like hearing you play again.”

“Hey, what children’s songs do you know?”

“Somewhere Over the Rainbow?”

Will blinks at her. “Ok, what else?”

Mackenzie shrugs. “Twinkle Twinkle?”

“Yeah I already thought of that one.”

“You’d have to Google it,” Mackenzie responds, shifting to curl up at his side, the baby pressing into his ribs, her head attempting to rest on his shoulder. He has to move his arm so he can put it around her, so she’ll fit against him more easily. He has to give up playing. He puts the guitar next to him, so it’s on the floor, leaning against the couch cushion. “Wiggles.”

“Huh?” Will asks.

“Kids listen to the Wiggles, don’t they?”

“I don’t really know.”

“I guess we’ll find out.”


	10. Chapter 10

“Come on,” Will says after a moment. “Let’s go to bed.”

“Mm, ok,” Mackenzie agrees.

They go back to the bedroom. Will does his teeth and changes for bed, while Mackenzie gets under the covers, hugging her body pillow to support the weight of the baby. “I had a few contractions before,” Mackenzie says as Will’s emerging from the walk in robe.

“What?” He asks alarmed.

“Two, but they were hours apart. Nothing’s happened since.”

“Oh,” Will approaches her back and she looks over her shoulder at him. He reaches to adjust the blanket at her spine, so there’s no air gap. She gives him a slight smile, and he reaches down to turn out her light. The nightlight is on in the bathroom, so there’s plenty of illumination for Will to see his way to his side of the bed. He slips under the covers and shifts across to where his wife is laying. He reaches over her waist to get to her back, rubbing his fingers into her spine. She gives a happy hum and he feels her fingers against his left shoulder, the one he’s lying on. “So, do you think the contractions where anything?” He asks casually.

“I don’t know,” Mackenzie says, sounding a bit like she’s whining, but trying not to. “They were probably nothing. But only time will tell.”

“Hm,” Will agrees. He shifts closer so he doesn’t have to stretch so far. He hopes he sleeps tonight, and doesn’t get paranoid that his wife is in labour.

“How was your day today?” Mackenzie asks softly. “I forgot to ask.”

“It was good,” Will responds.

“And how was it with Habib?”

“Good,” Will says carefully. “He and I talked about cutting back on sessions.”

He feels the moment that statement sinks in for Mackenzie. She stiffens. “What do you mean?” Her voice is terse.

“He felt like I was ready to start cutting back a bit,” Will says gently.

“Do you think that’s a good idea?” Mackenzie asks sharply.

“I don’t think it was a good idea bringing this up now,” Will says instead. He hears Mackenzie sigh, and when she speaks again her voice is much more controlled. “I meant, is that – do you agree with him? Do you feel like you want to? And that you feel like you could?”

“I actually do,” Will says lightly. “But we don’t need to talk about this now.”

“I want to,” Mackenzie almost whines again.

“I’m not trying to shut you out honey, I just want to make sure you get some decent sleep, and you and I already know we have problems with starting serious conversations late at night.”

“Hm,” Mackenzie half agrees.

“Which is also a really dumb idea when you’re already tired.”

“I’m pregnant, I don’t need kid gloves.”

“You’re a liability,” Will says thoughtlessly, and hears his wife hiss a breath. “That’s not what I meant,” he adds quickly. “I mean, we’re having tense times. That’s not what I meant either. I meant –” He stops abruptly before he digs himself a hole bigger than he can get out of.

“You mean I’m grumpy at the moment, likely to snap.”

“No!” He says forcefully. But yes.

“I’m sorry,” Mackenzie says tritely. “I do hear myself but the tone just keeps on coming.”

“I get it,” Will says quickly. “You’re very pregnant and you’re very tired and anxious about Saturday, and things are just tense at the moment. That’s what I meant. Not that you’re being –”

“A bitch?”

“Never,” Will says.

Mackenzie gives a slight laugh and sighs again. “I really don’t mean to take anything out on you.”

“Happy to be your punching bag,” he reiterates.

“And if you feel ok about not seeing Habib then – I just worry about you.”

“I know. But this should be an indication that worry is less needed.”

“But you’ll be on your own.”

“I’m not on my own,” Will points out quickly. “I’m still going to be taking the anti-depressants and I have you and I’ll still see Habib, just less. There are still things I want to talk about –”

“Like what?” Mackenzie asks sharply.

“My Dad. I’d like to know things more from his point of view.”

“Can Habib know that kind of thing?”

“He’s pretty intuitive. I think his experience as a psychiatrist will probably mean he can predict or explain why my dad behaved the way he did.”

Mackenzie is silent a moment. Will moves on from her spine to the muscles in her lower back, working out to her glutes and up again. It stresses his back, reaching like this, so he’ll stop soon, but he hopes it’s helped a little.

“I’d be curious to know why too,” Mackenzie says in a small voice.

She’s probably fishing for an invite, but Will’s not sure he wants her to know, until he knows himself – she’s probably saying she wants to come to the session, but he doesn’t want that. “I’ll tell you about it,” he offers, and hopes she won’t be offended by the rejection.

“I’d like to hear,” she says instead.

Will withdraws his arm. “Sorry, my back hurts,” he says.

“Mine too,” Mackenzie says lightly, but her fingers stroke at his shoulder. “Thank you.”

Will turns so he’s lying on his back. Mackenzie moves her fingers to the front of his shoulder, rubbing his t-shirt lightly. He reaches up to take her fingers and shifts them to his other hand, so their fingers are linked where they rest on the mattress.

“You could go to an Al-Anon meeting,” Mackenzie says quietly.

Will feels his heckles rise. He knows it’s a purely defensive response, but he doesn’t know why it keeps happening. Because old habits are hard to break? So he takes an extra moment to let that anger and frustration settle down again before saying, “Maybe.”

“Habib thought it would be a good idea,” Mackenzie says meekly.

“I know,” Will says, his tone entirely under control. He also doesn’t understand why he’s resistant to going to an Al-Anon meeting. Going to just one wouldn’t hurt him. Just to see what it’s like. Ok, maybe he could at least try it. “I’ll check it out.”

Mackenzie doesn’t say anything to that, but he feels the pressure in her fingers tighten for a moment, an involuntary response. She’s pleased but she doesn’t want to rub it in, and he’s glad she doesn’t. It’s enough that he’s conceded. Now that he’s given his word, he has to follow through though.

“Love you,” Will says to the darkened room.

“Love you too,” Mackenzie responds. And then he falls asleep.

 

 

**********

 

_23 rd January 2014_

_Thursday_

_D-Day -2_

Will wakes twice in the night when Mackenzie does and on the second time, he stays half awake, waiting for her to come back to bed, but she doesn’t. He rolls over to check the time and finds that it’s seven am. Then he notices the bathroom door is closed and he thinks he can hear the shower going. He mashes his face into his pillow for a second, and then runs out of air and turns over again. He’s not used to being awake this early, but he should be. His new born baby is going to need feeding every two hours, including all through the night. He throws back the cover and gets out of bed. He pulls back the curtains and stares at the park and the city around it. There’s already traffic on the streets, a row of yellow cabs, nose to nose, and a cyclist weaving his or her way through them.

“What are you doing up?”

Will turns and sees Mackenzie coming in, a large dark blue towel around her body, her hair up in a bun on top of her head. She looks different with her hair up like that. “You didn’t come back to bed,” Will says with a shrug. He moves to straighten out the blankets.

“Did I wake you?” Mackenzie asks as she goes to the closet.

“No, I just noticed you hadn’t come back to bed.” Will reaches to put her body pillow on top of the sheets.

“So I woke you?” Mackenzie asks, her voice muffled by the wall.

Not really, but Will can’t be bothered arguing the point. It’s early, and neither of them are caffeinated. He goes to use the bathroom, stooping to pick up the bathmat Mackenzie used when she got out of the shower. He does it every morning and he doesn’t even care that he’s picking up after her, because she can hardly bend over right now. When he gets back to the bedroom, Mackenzie’s still getting dressed. She has a shirt on, but not much else. Will goes to lean against the door frame of the wardrobe, folding his arms across his chest; it’s cold. He watches her, notes how slowly she moves, and carefully, hanging onto a cubby as she puts her legs, one at a time, into her trousers. He’s a little on edge, just in case she falls. Which is entirely patronising. She’s a grown ass woman who is clearly capable of dressing herself and has been doing so for well over thirty-years. It’s just that, she’s never been this pregnant before. And Will hasn’t seen how carefully she moves while she’s only standing on one leg. And he worries about her sometimes. Especially when she’s this pregnant. And standing on one leg.

“Breakfast,” Will says.

“Huh?” Mackenzie looks up at him.

“Breakfast?” Will says again, clearing his throat a little.

“Are you offering to make me something?”

“Yes.”

Mackenzie gives a slight smile. “Pancakes and maple syrup and bacon and whipped cream?”

“I think we have bacon,” Will says flatly. “And I’m sure I could find a recipe for pancakes.”

“I really couldn’t. I’d feel ill all day. How about toast?”

“Cup of tea?” Will offers.

“Lovely.”

Will leaves her to do her pants up. The rest of the apartment is cold too, and the tiled kitchen floor is icy against his feet. He puts the water on to boil, and jams bread in the toaster, and then heads back to the bedroom for socks. Mackenzie is sitting on the edge of the bed, awkwardly putting socks on herself. She has a leg up, so her ankle is resting on the knee of her other leg, and Will walks in just as she tries to whip it onto her foot before it slides back to the floor. Mackenzie looks over at him and then hefts her foot to her knee again, to straighten out the sock.

“It’s freezing out there,” Will notes as he drops to a knee in front of her. His bad knee is not happy, but he doesn’t press that one to the carpet. He takes his wife’s foot and straightens out her sock, noting its a thin one, one of her summer socks.

“Thank you,” Mackenzie says, giving him the other sock so he can put it on her other foot. Will stands again, his knee almost giving out on him. He has to reach for the bed to steady himself. “I was going to say that went a lot more smoothly,” Mackenzie quips. “But now I’m not so sure.”

Will shakes his head at her teasing and goes to get himself socks, and a sweater. Mackenzie goes to brush out her hair and put make up on, and Will goes back to the kitchen. He puts more bread in the toaster and spreads butter on the luke-warm toast he just retrieved. He goes to the fridge for jelly and marmalade and milk for Mackenzie’s tea. Damn, he forgot to put the coffee on. He does that, sorts out the next lot of toast, and makes tea. He’s got a couple of things to do today (aside from actual work, off course). Find an Al-Anon meeting and find kids songs to play on the guitar.

Mackenzie joins him and stands at the bench while she eats and sips her tea. “What are you going to do with all your free time this morning?”

Will chews his toast. “I’m sure I’ll find something.”

Mackenzie gives him a slight smile. “Will you go back to sleep?”

Will sips his coffee. “No,” he shakes his head.

“You could find an Al-Anon meeting.”

“I was going to,” he says, tightly.

“Well make sure you do,” Mackenzie says lightly, sipping her tea.

Will takes a slow breath. “Don’t push,” he says softly, and even though he used the phrase they agreed on in therapy, to let Mackenzie know when he’s feeling like she’s harassing him, and he said it really, really carefully, she still looks chagrined.

“Sorry,” she murmurs.

Will gives a hefty shrug. “Morning probably isn’t the best time for a conversation,” he tries.

“So not at night and not in the morning,” Mackenzie says, her tone a little sharp.

Will decides to clean up the bench.

“Sorry!” Mackenzie says loudly. She sighs heavily. “I really suck at this at the moment.” She moves to stand next to him, taking his arm and deliberately moving it so she can stand within his embrace. He puts his other arm around her too, the baby pressing into him. He puts a kiss to her hair, telling her it’s ok. “It’s not ok, and you don’t have to pretend –”

“We’ve been here before,” Will cuts in. “Honey, it’s ok.” He holds her for a long moment, until she pulls away. He’d stand there all day if she wanted. She avoids his eye as she steps away and he thinks she might have been crying, and he wishes he had the right words to make her feel better. He doesn’t know how else to say that he gets she’s tense at the moment, because the birth is on her mind, and that he’ll take all the punches she can throw, because he’s not the one that has to squeeze another person out of his body. That’s a lot of pressure to be under and he totally gets it. They can’t avoid all conversation until after the baby’s born. The entire point of marriage counselling was to be able to get through the tough times together. He doesn’t have to be a doormat, but he can take some extra heat while she’s under stress.

Will steps up behind his wife and puts his arms around her again, from behind. One across the front of her sternum, the other reaching to take her hand. He presses a kiss against the side of her cheek. She smells like make up and perfume; she doesn’t tend to wear much of it, but it’s sweet and she’s been wearing it for years. “I love you,” he murmurs near her ear. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. It’s not your fault you’re pregnant.”

Mackenzie laughs suddenly and Will smiles. She wasn’t expecting that. “Maybe a little,” she says meekly.

Will chuckles. “It’s not your fault you’re _still_ pregnant.”

Mackenzie gives a huff of a laugh.

“Let’s just get through the next two days, ok?”

Mackenzie nods.

“It’ll be different when you can cut down on your stress load.”

Mackenzie nods again. Will plants another kiss on her. “Thank you for getting up this morning,” she says quietly. “I liked that.”


	11. Chapter 11

After Mackenzie leaves, Will uses the laptop to find sheet music for children’s nursery rhymes, Christmas songs, and other popular children’s music, most of which he doesn’t really know. It’s all pretty simple, and he orders half a dozen books that will arrive tomorrow. After that he procrastinates the shit out of finding an Al-Anon meeting by taking his shower, shaving, and getting dressed. He’s early for work, but decides to walk, to kill a bit more time, and once he’s there, he surprises some plebe on the assignment desk. He swears new people are arriving who he doesn’t know.

He goes to his office and feels restless. He sighs and goes to his computer, nudging it to life. He’ll look into an Al-Anon meeting then. He takes his phone from his pocket and sits and notices the light is blinking. There’s a message. He grabs it up, wondering if Mackenzie is ok or if she needs – it’s from Gideon.

 

**Gabriella Sophie. 6lbs 12.**

**Arrived at 4pm yesterday.**

**Everyone’s fine. Mommas**

**a champion!**

Will sits for a moment, looking at the text, a proud smile on his face. Well. There she is. Everyone’s fine and his friend is a father. He texts back:

 

**Congratulations!**

**Glad to hear all is**

**well.**

And then forwards the text from Gideon to Mackenzie. Who would he call first to break the news of his son’s birth? Mackenzie’s mother. That’s a no brainer. Or she might do that herself. But who would he call, specifically? The first person he feels to the need to share anything with is Mackenzie, but after her, who?

Charlie.

He’d call Charlie, but Charlie isn’t here to call. Actually, he’d probably like to call Habib and tell him, but he’s not entirely sure that that would be appropriate. They’re not friends. So he supposes he’d text Gideon to share the news, but he’d still like to tell his therapist before they release a statement to the press (which he originally objected to, when he and Mackenzie talked about it several weeks ago, but he figures he’d rather release some truth, than have TMI make something up).

He’d have to text the News Night crew. That’s who he would contact first. That’s who Mackenzie would want him to contact first, after her parents. A mass email to the staff, then text Gideon. Who else?

Will reaches for a Post-it note and jots the list down. And then he realises he’s at work and he has nowhere to put this list to remind him. The baby preparation lists are at home (the list for things the baby needed, things they needed to do before the baby was born, the list of names, the list of things for the hospital bag…). Will sticks the Post-it to itself, and puts the slip of paper in his wallet. He needs the insurance information too, so he can call them after the baby’s born. He takes the slip of paper out and writes _insurance_ on it as well.

Kelli walks into Will’s office, looks up and sees him, and jumps. “Geeze!”

Will blinks at her. “Sorry.”

“No, I wasn’t expecting you to be here. You’re here early.”

“So are you.”

“I’m always here early,” she responds, approaching the desk. “It’s my job.”

“Oh, well, I’m,” Will gestures to his computer, which is showing the ACN screensaver. Not working. (Also not looking up that Al-Anon meeting). Kelli gives him the morning brief and he thanks her. Kelli turns to leave again. “Hey, can I ask you something?” Will calls her back.

Kelli turns him, eyebrows raised. “Sure.”

“It’s personal,” Will warns.

“Then I’ll reserve my right to answer until after I hear what it is.”

“Fair enough.”

“Do I need to sit for this?” Kelli asks lightly.

“No. If you want to,” he gestures to one of the seats opposite his desk. Kelli goes to sit on the edge of it. “When you – when Rachel was towards the end of her pregnancy.”

Kelli blinks at him.

“Any advice?” Will asks.

Kelli considers him a moment. “Uh, well, it was a while ago now.”

“Sure. Just, any advice about what I can do to help ease her burden?”

Kelli sits for a moment. “Uhm.”

“Anything you wish you’d been told before by someone who had gone through the whole birthing process?”

“Actually yeah,” Kelli says slowly. “This sounds strange, but you know when you did the birthing classes and they taught you about the pressure points in her back, for pain relief?”

“Yeah,” Will nods.

“At the time, I remember wishing I had something really solid to jam in Rachel’s back. She kept asking for more pressure and my thumbs just didn’t have the strength,” Kelli mimics the movement of pressing her thumbs into an imaginary back.

“Something solid?”

“Yeah, like a couple of pens or sticks.”

Will chuckles and Kelli laughs with him. “I know, it sounds so weird, but if we ever have more kids, I will be packing wooden spoons or something into the hospital bag,” Kelli adds.

Will nods. “Ok, thank you. I’ll pack some wooden spoons.”

Kelli gives him a smile and gets to her feet. “No problem.” She goes to the door and Will nudges his computer to cut the screensaver. Kelli turns back to him. “I do remember Rachel knelt on the floor and leaned on the bed a lot. She said it was the only position where the pain didn’t drive her insane.”

Will nods. “Ok.”

Kelli gives a nod in return and goes for the door. Will starts hunting for a legal pad. There has to be one on his desk somewhere. Kelli comes back in. “And also, if there’s any way you can steal her phone.”

Will gives her an alarmed expression.

“It’s just that, _everyone_ text _every day_ to ask if she’d had the babies yet, or if anything was happening yet, or if she had any contractions yet, and it really got to her. Obviously if she’d had the babies we would have said.”

Will nods.

“So, yeah, if you can try to intercept all those messages, that would probably help. If Mackenzie gets annoyed by that kind of thing.”

Oh, Will thinks she would be annoyed by that kind of thing. He would too. “Thanks,” he says aloud.

Kelli gives another nod and leaves again. She doesn’t come back this time. Will finds a legal pad amongst a stack of papers and tears off a clean sheet to write down the things Kelli just mentioned. He also takes out his Post-It note and transfers those transcriptions to his list.

 

 

**********

 

_24 th January 2014_

_Friday_

_D-Day-1_

Will wakes several times in the night, and only once when Mackenzie actually gets up. He’s trying to keep tabs on her, but the paranoia has him waking at the end of every sleep cycle, instead of just when she gets out of bed. So when she does, because that’s what he’s been waiting for, he finally falls into a deep sleep. And then wakes himself in a panic fifteen minutes later, wondering what time it is and whether Mackenzie has come back to bed or not. If she has not, it’s time to get up. If she has, then he can go back to sleep.

She has not.

He retracts his hand from her side of the cooling bed and rolls to check the time. Seven thirty. Ok, he hasn’t missed her entirely. He forces his eyes open, blinking against a dark bedroom. The bathroom door is closed but he’s not sure he can hear water running. She might not be showering. She could be getting dressed. She could be in the kitchen having breakfast. Will sits himself and throws back the covers sluggishly. This probably wasn’t a good idea, making himself wake up so early. It’s important for him to get regular and good quality sleep, for his depression. But after the baby comes, that will be all shot to shit anyway. It’s just one day. Tomorrow he can sleep in. Tomorrow, Mackenzie will sleep in. And the day after and the day after that, hopefully, until the baby comes anyway.

Will stands and staggers to the curtains. He half pulls one, letting in a little grey of dawn. Then he staggers to the bathroom, until his body wakes up properly, his knee joints stiff and his bad knee sore, and taps on the door. There’s no answer so he pushes it a little and when no one protests he goes in. He uses the toilet and washes his hands. He picks up the bathmat Mackenzie left behind when she had her shower this morning. He wonders if she’s still getting dressed. He goes to get a sweater, but she’s not in the walk in robe.

She’s in the kitchen, making toast, and she gives him a curious smile as he comes in. He goes to where she’s standing, jelly in one hand, butter knife in the other. He presses a kiss to the side of her head, a hand on the baby. “Good morning,” she says lightly.

“Morning,” Will murmurs, and moves away to make coffee.

“Couldn’t sleep?”

Will reaches for the coffee. “I wanted to spend the time with you,” he says.

“You didn’t get enough of my charming self, last night?”

“Always,” Will answers absently, adding water to the coffee machine. When he turns to his wife, he notices her shoulders are hunched towards her ears slightly (he misses the bit where it sounded like he implied he has had enough of how she was grumpy last night. What he _meant_ was, he never gets enough of her). He goes to stand at her back, placing his hands on her shoulders. She tenses for a second until he rubs his thumbs into the back of her scapula. “You ok?” he asks softly.

“Uh huh,” Mackenzie says.

“Last day today,” he notes. Thank god. This week has not been great.

“Hm,” Mackenzie says.

Will shifts his thumbs in small increments towards her spine, then up her neck. “When’s Minahan coming up?”

“Hm?”

“Minahan? He’s coming up to meet you today?”

“Hm,” Mackenzie says.

Will waits a moment but there is no more forthcoming information. “Are you listening to me?”

“Uh huh.”

He stops his ministrations and leans over his wife’s shoulder to see her face. Her eyes snap open to look at him and she smiles embarrassed for a moment. “That felt really nice.”

“Clearly distracting though.”

She nudges him away from her with her bum and goes back to her toast. Will steps away, a wry smile on his face, and gets a mug from the cupboard for his coffee. She’s in a much better mood in the mornings. Which he gets. Long day, very pregnant, tired etc. He’s learnt a lot about patience in the last month. He figures it’s not the half of it though. Wait until his son cries all night.

“You want some toast?” Mackenzie asks.

“Sure,” Will agrees, drinking his coffee black. He turns to lean against the bench and Mackenzie moves to put bread in the toaster for him. He thinks about repeating his observation that today is her last day at work, but maybe she was ignoring him on purpose, and he’s not one to force conversation if he doesn’t have to. Will looks down at Mackenzie’s feet and notices she has shoes and socks on. Completely missed it this morning.

“My mother called this morning,” Mackenzie says.

“Hm?” Will looks up. “What did she want?”

“To see if anything was happening,” Mackenzie says lightly. She goes back to her toast.

“Is anything happening?” Will asks, sipping his coffee.

“No,” Mackenzie says sharply, glancing over her shoulder at him.

“I was just asking,” Will says neutrally.

Mackenzie sighs. “I know. Sorry. It’s just, she called, Meredith text, which is so weird, because I _never_ hear from her.”

Will puts his coffee down on the bench.

“And then she pretends that she forgot we’re in different time zones.”

Will takes a step forward to where Mackenzie is standing by the toaster.

“She’s so – what are you doing?” She asks as Will pulls her into a hug.

“Hugging you,” he says.

Mackenzie puts her arms around him, and he has to hunch over to compensate for his height and the baby. “I love you,” he says.

“I love you too,” Mackenzie responds softly.

“Ignore all texts from your sisters please. Don’t even open them.”

“What if it’s a medical emergency?”

“I’m sure someone will call you.”

Mackenzie gives a huff of air that tickles Will’s neck. He moves to straighten up but stays with his wife, putting his hands on her shoulders. Her hands slide to his hips and hold on there and she looks up at him, her eyes dark and her cheeks a little pink.

“Let’s just get through today, ok?”

Mackenzie nods. “Ok.”


	12. Chapter 12

Will says goodbye to Mackenzie at the door and when he turns to go and get dressed, he sees the hospital bag waiting on the floor by the side table. He remembers the wooden spoons Kelli recommended and goes to retrieve them now. He tucks them into the bottom of the duffle bag and then showers and shaves. When he’s dressed he gets a call that a courier has dropped off a package for him and goes down to pick that up. It’s his sheet music, of children’s songs and nursery rhymes. He plays around for an hour or so, until his fingers are sore from pressing the strings. His respectable guitar playing callouses have faded in the months he stopped playing and it hurts to reform them.

He texts Mackenzie to tell her he loves her and hopes she’s having a good morning. Then he goes to get ready for work. He has so much time on his hands getting up early! He walks to work. It’s cold out, but it’s not raining or snowing and by the time he gets to the office, he’s warm. Everyone’s already in when he gets there and he says good morning to those he passes on his way to his office. The morning brief is already on his desk and he glances down the bullet pointed notes about what’s happening in the world right now, while he pulls his phone out of his pocket to see if Mackenzie text him back while he was walking and didn’t notice. She has.

 

**Love you too babe.**

**Your text made me**

**smile. My day is ok but**

**am starting to feel like**

**I’m an exotic animal**

**here for entertainment.**

**Want to play ‘when will**

**Mackenzie pop?’**

Will reads the message twice, and wonders if he should read more into it. He gets that she’s frustrated, but should he run up there to fight everyone off with a stick? Probably not. She won’t thank him for it. If anything, her sharp tongue will keep people at a bay for a while. So he chooses to read the message in a more resigned tone.

 

**It’s nearly over.**

He hesitates over sending it. Then adds a string of kisses and wonders what he can do to surprise her later this evening, or on the weekend, to cheer her up a little.

 

**I know! Hanging**

**in there. How’s your**

**day? Has it started**

**yet?**

He could be offended by that query. A dig at him having later work hours or whatever, and six months ago, he would have. Given the way Mackenzie’s been sniping at him in the last week, he could go on the defensive. But he remembers their counselling that suggests unless he’s sure, he shouldn’t assume. He doesn’t know for sure she’s trying to attack him, so that means he doesn’t need to go on the defensive. She could honestly just be asking him if he’s at work yet.

 

**It has. But I’m wasting**

**time texting with you** **J**

**Probably should go to**

**the pitch meeting though.**

**Meet you for lunch?**

He waits for a moment to see if she’ll text him back before he goes to his meeting. He hopes she does. Maybe he could… where was the? Last year they went to a place that makes the sandwiches she said she really liked. Beef, he thinks it was. Somewhere around – his phone buzzes at him.

 

**I’d love to have lunch.**

**Supposed to be meeting**

**Minahan. Send food and**

**other help. Keep watch**

**for flares.**

 

Ok, she’s being funny. She must be in a good mood.

 

**Will do.**

Will texts back, and goes to the pitch meeting.

 

 

**********

 

Just after midday, a courier arrives with a delivery of flowers. Mackenzie sees him walk past her office with them, catches her name in the conversation the courier has with Millie, and then sees him walk by again, empty handed. Millie comes into Mackenzie’s office a moment later, bringing the pale pink and white bouquet of flowers with her and a broad smile. She puts them down on the corner of Mackenzie’s desk and hands her the card, which is in a sealed envelope. “They’re beautiful,” Millie says, standing to wait for Mackenzie to read the card.

“They are,” Mackenzie agrees and tears open the envelope. They’re probably from Will. They _are_ from Will. The card says: _My hero. Love Will._ In his handwriting too, which means he went out to get them. Mackenzie looks up at her waiting assistant. “They’re from Will,” she confirms and Millie beams more and tells her she’s ‘lucky’. Yes, Mackenzie supposes, she is lucky. Lucky Will has patience and is forgiving (which is ironic, given what happened when they broke up. But since then, he’s been _really_ forgiving). Mackenzie feels the baby attempting to move, but he’s face down in her pelvis, and is too big inside her to move much at all. She drops a hand to her belly in a subconscious move to settle him. But Millie can take that anyway she wants to. She’ll assume Mackenzie’s thinking of being lucky to have married a great guy and is having a baby. She goes back to her desk. Mackenzie wouldn’t consider that luck though. Chance may have had Will walk through her newsroom door one day, but since then it’s been deliberate decision making and quite a bit of hard work. She’s not complaining, and she knows relationships aren’t always smooth sailing. Maybe she’s lucky to have a husband who pushes them to see professionals when they need help, which has only made their relationship stronger. Maybe it would be considered unlucky that they needed professional help at all.

Maybe luck is how she looks at it.

She tucks the card amongst the flowers, so she doesn’t forget to take it home with her when she leaves at the end of the day. She honestly doesn’t know when she’ll be back. If she’ll take the twelve weeks and be back, or if she’ll resign at the end of them, or try to negotiate part time hours with Pruit, but she’d be loath to think when she walks out at the end of the day, that that would be the last time. It’s a dilemma that doesn’t have an answer yet. Like picking a name for the baby. She thinks Will has it right though, have a list of a few options, decide when he’s here.

Her computer starts ringing and she turns to it to answer the Skype call. “Hi Josh,” she greets as his face comes into view.

 

 

**********

 

Franklin arrives in Will’s office to report back. “She was there,” he confirms. “And I gave her the sub.”

“And what did she say?” Will asks.

“She said thank you.”

Will stares at the kid for a second. “Did she seem pleased?” He asks slowly, with heavy eye contact.

“Yeah, I guess. She smiled and said thank you.”

Will narrows his eyes slightly. He was kind of hoping for a bit more reaction than that. Maybe he should have sent Tess.

“She was on a call though.”

“She was on the phone?” Will asks for clarification.

“No, Skype.”

“Did you see who she was Skyping with?” Will asks, because he can be totally nosey about what his wife is doing (or because whoever she was talking to may have affected her reaction to the sub).

“A guy.”

Will feels a pang of something in his stomach. Stupid. She works with other men. Calm down. “Did you catch a name at all?”

“Uh, I think she said ‘hang on Josh’ as I came in.”

“Josh Minahan?”

Franklin looks awkward. “I wouldn’t really know.”

“Ok,” Will nods. “You can go.”

“Was this a test?” Franklin asks boldly.

“A little bit,” Will confirms, reaching for his Blackberry as it buzzes. He ignores the kid as he focuses on his phone, and it kills any chance of him asking how he’d done on his test. Will’s not sure, average, at best. If he’s going to be an investigative journalist he’ll have to try a little harder.

 

**Will! I LOVE these**

**sandwiches! And I**

**know you went all the**

**way uptown to get**

**it for me, because you**

**signed the card on the**

**beautiful, beautiful**

**flowers that arrived**

**in my office an hour**

**ago. Thank you, you big**

**sweet man. I love you**

**like crazy and I very**

**much look forward to**

**going home tonight and**

**curling up in your arms**

**as much as the lump**

**will let me get close to**

**you. xxxxxxxx**

 

Will beams. Now _that_ was the fucking reaction he was looking for.

(Also, see Franklin? That’s how an investigative journalist does it.)

 

**Love you too**

**honey. And that**

**other stuff about**

**curling up together.**

**That sounds good**

**too. xxx**

 

 

**********

 

Ok. She thinks she’s got everything sorted. She’s just about written the Monday report for Josh, but he should be fine. He has to report to her on Monday’s about what’s going on in DC and it’s not much different than having to report to Pruit, except there’s about twice the amount of data to keep track of. They talked at length about the Newshub and Mackenzie hopes that he doesn’t do anything with it while she’s gone. She feels protective of it. It’s her (and Neal’s) pet project and she’d hate to miss out on something. Or have it be ruined. She’s wrapped up all other projects, which included having new graphics built for their ‘Hollywood Report’ show – which also, by the way, can use crowd sourcing all she fucking cares. The show is all about gossip and conjecture and prying into strangers lives anyway. She’s even taken a look at the app proposal, and given her approval. It’s going to be in development for a few months, so hopefully she’ll be back in time to involved in the creative process.

She’s ready to go home. Well, not home, just yet, but she’s ready to leave her office in someone else’s hands for three months while she has a baby.

A tap on her door as her looking over, and Pruit comes in. “Good evening,” she greets.

He comes to stand in front of her desk, looking happy. “Evening,” he echoes. “Just about ready to go?”

“I am,” Mackenzie confirms, trying not to be worried about why he looks so happy. He means: is everything in order before she takes leave. Pruit nods. And looks at her flowers. “They’re from Will,” she says into the silence.

Pruit nods, an ‘ah’, expression on his face. “Hey, so I came to say goodbye.”

Mackenzie gives him a bright smile.

“And good luck, I guess, if that’s an appropriate thing to wish a pregnant woman.”

“I will take it in the good spirit with which it was intended,” Mackenzie responds.

“Also, I might not be here when you get back so –”

“What?” Mackenzie interrupts, with a frown. “What do you mean you won’t be here when I get back?”

“I usually spend a year in my new companies –”

“That’s April?”

Pruit gives her a ‘so what?’ type expression.

“Well,” Mackenzie shifts her weight on her foot. “I hope you –”

Won’t leave without saying goodbye.

“Don’t try to put a Twitter scroll back up on News Night while I’m away,” she says instead.

Pruit laughs and holds up his hands in a sign of parley, his blackberry tucked under the thumb of his right hand, “Promise. I learnt my lesson.”

Mackenzie gives a wry smile.

“I’m very impressed with your work,” Pruit says seriously.

“Thank you,” Mackenzie says with emotion, her chest feeling tight with it. _Finally,_ some recognition from her boss.

“And I’m sure my news station will be fine in your hands when I’m not around.”

Mackenzie could hug him. “Thank you,” she says again.

Pruit gives a nod. “Ok. See ya.”

“See ya,” Mackenzie echoes and he leaves. Her phone starts ringing and she sees Will’s name come up on the screen. “Hey you,” she greets.

“Hey you,” Will echoes. “Are you coming down soon?”

“Yes,” she says carefully, picking up on something in his tone. “Are we meeting in the conference room for dinner?”

“Uh, yeah,” Will hedges. “So you’re coming down now?”

“Yes,” Mackenzie says, reaching over to turn the screen of her computer off. “I’m literally about to walk out of my office.” She slings her purse to her shoulder and walks around her desk to scoop up the vase of flowers Will had delivered earlier.

“I’ll see you soon,” Will says and cuts the call. Mackenzie slips her phone into her purse and goes to the door, stopping to look back at her tidy desk, her name plate in the front and a small stack of paper in the middle for Josh when he comes in on Monday. A stark difference to when she walked in seven months ago. And look at that. She’s stopped referring to it as Charlie’s office.

She flips the lights and walks out.


	13. Chapter 13

Will walks out of his office and into the busy bull pen. The people closest to him stop work to give him their attention without him having to raise his voice, but he does so anyway to get the rest of the staff’s attention. “Everybody!” He calls out and the noise dies down. “Mackenzie’s on her way down now,” he announces and there are happy expressions on their faces. “But, hey,” Will goes on, getting them to settle again. “Can we just – no one say anything about how big she is, or that she hasn’t had the baby yet, or that she’ll probably be overdue. Don’t ask her when her due date is again, and please, no one mention the pool I know you guys have running about the baby’s height and weight and gender and when he’ll be here.”

“It’s a boy!?” Tess cuts in loudly.

“Shit,” Will cusses.

Half the room cries out, with fists pumps, and ‘I knew it’s!’ While the other half groans their displeasure.

“Can everyone also not mention to Mackenzie that I just told you we’re having a boy?” Will asks, unable to stop smiling proudly as he’s congratulated. “Also,” he raises his voice to be heard over them all talking excitedly. “No comments about elephant gestations, or comparisons to other large mammals, or hints on how to go into labour or anything like that. No one imply that she’s huge or looks tired or looks anything other than glowing and happy and healthy. Ok?”

He gets blank stares and blinking eyes, surprised expressions and a few nervous smiles (Kelli looks amused). But they do nod and agree.

“Thank you very much,” Will says and goes to walk to the elevators. He’s just approaching when one pings and the doors open and Mackenzie steps out.

“Hi,” she greets him with a bright smile. “I get a welcoming committee?”

“It’s just me so far,” Will says, moving to take the flowers for her. He leans down to give her a quick kiss.

“The best welcoming committee,” Mackenzie says. “You’ll never _believe_ what happened to me just now.”

Will was about to start walking to the bull pen, but stops suddenly. The water in the vase sloshes, but it’s sealed so his jersey is safe. “Are you –?”

“No,” Mackenzie says, a little bashful. “Not the baby. Pruit.”

“Pruit?” Will frowns as they start walking again.

“He told me he thought I was doing a good job running his news network.”

Will stops walking again to stare at his wife. “Seriously?”

“Seriously!”  Mackenzie enthuses.  

“Congratulations,” Will says, stooping to kiss her again.

She grabs a fistful of jersey at his stomach, keeping him close to kiss him again. “Is everyone waiting for us, or can we –”

Will raises his eyebrows in surprise at her.

“I don’t mean sneak away to have sex in the janitor’s closet but –”

“They’re waiting for us,” Will confirms.

“Ok,” Mackenzie sighs. “But tonight though.”

He agrees, though he doesn’t know what he’s agreeing too. They haven’t had sex this year, and he totally gets it. She’s huge and pregnant and tired and he’s not even sure she’s really in the mood. ‘Tonight though’ could just mean alone time, but if she wants to have sex, that would be ok with him too.

“I’m proud of you too,” Will says as he straightens up.

Mackenzie gives him a coy smile and marches off. Waddles. Not very quickly. Will catches her easily, but stays on her heels. She walks into the newsroom bull pen and everyone is either in the conference room or crowding around outside of it. They’ve whipped up the bunches of balloons and the banner that says ‘Good Luck!’ on it, and they cheer when they see her.

There’s pizza and soda on the conference room table and they have a little farewell party. Will puts Mackenzie’s flowers on the table and grabs a slice and a soda and sits halfway down the table, to the side, listening to the conversation around him, attentive to anything his wife might need. The staff look after her, offering her the pizza box so she doesn’t have to reach, topping up her soda, refraining from making any comments whatsoever about how she really does look like she’s ready to give birth now. They drop Will in it for spoiling the baby’s gender, which makes Mackenzie wince, but then she asks who called it and half the staff raise their hands, making her laugh.

Eventually Jim calls the party off, at least for those who still have work to do before broadcast, which is mostly everyone and they file back to their desks, with promises that Mackenzie isn’t leaving just yet.

“What about you?” Mackenzie asks Will. “Do you have work to do?”

Will gives a pout of his mouth. “Some.”

“You should go do it.”

He stands. “You’ll be all right here?”

“I manage to get through my entire day without you hovering over me,” she says simply.

Will gives her a disparaging expression and leaves for his office. He’s got to finish up his copy and get it to the studio guys, and of course, change for broadcast.

Sloan comes back into the conference room and stops. “Where did everyone go?”

“To do some work,” Mackenzie answers.

“Oh well I don’t have to do that,” Sloan says, taking a seat by the head of the table, where Mackenzie is still sitting. “Want to catch up, girlfriend?”

“Sure,” Mackenzie agrees. “How are things going with you and Don?”

Sloan sits back and crosses one leg over the other at the knee. “Good. Really good.”

“You’ve been together for a while,” Mackenzie enthuses.

“Yeah I think we might be getting serious.”

“You weren’t serious before?” Mackenzie asks curiously.

“I don’t know.”

“Have you had the ‘talk’?”

“What talk?”

“The talk about how serious you are.”

“Did you and Will have the talk?”

“I think getting married was pretty indicative of how serious he was about our relationship.”

Sloan considers her with a straight face. “That would be pretty clear, yeah.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Mackenzie goes on. “You don’t have to put a label on it if you don’t want to.”

“Now I’m wondering where Don sees this going.” She twists in her seat and looks for him. “But I should probably talk to him about it later.”

“Probably,” Mackenzie agrees.

“Let’s talk about you,” Sloan changes the subject. “How are you doing? With a giant baby inside you?”

“I feel like I have a giant baby inside me,” Mackenzie answers. “But otherwise ok. Tired.”

“Yeah you look tired,” Sloan states. “So, do you think you’ll go into labour soon?”

“I honestly have no idea,” Mackenzie sits back in her chair. Her ass is getting numb, sitting too long. It doesn’t help that the weight of the baby presses on the nerves in her hips, making them feel tingly and uncomfortable. She generally feels uncomfortable these days. “He’ll come when he’s ready.”

“I bet that’s kind of annoying,” Sloan says. “You just have to wait around.”

“Hm,” Mackenzie agrees.

“Did you always want kids?” Sloan asks lightly.

“Honestly?” Mackenzie reaches for her soda, and sits back again. “No. Not really. I didn’t feel particularly maternal at all.”

“What changed?” Sloan asks, intrigued.

“Will.”

“He talked you into it?”

“No,” Mackenzie gives a slight chuckle. “Being with him changed my mind. It’s the strangest thing, but even when we were dating the first time, I started thinking about having babies with him. I wanted to have _his_ babies. The idea of having a family with him was really – it just made sense to me. It’s hard to explain.”

“No, I get it,” Sloan muses. “I sometimes feel that way about Don. I mean, after my fiancé cheated on me, I didn’t really believe much in marriage anymore. And I thought I’d never find a guy who would make me change my mind, or a guy who wanted to get married – all guys are commitment phobic.”

Mackenzie nods she understands, even though it’s a generalisation. It was Will who pushed her to commit to him, after all.

“But with Don, it feels different. I feel like maybe we might one day.”

“That’s nice,” Mackenzie says warmly.

“It feels like we’re getting there slowly.”

“Slow is fine,” Mackenzie agrees.

“I don’t know about kids though,” Sloan adds.

“Well, each woman to themselves.”

“What if Don wants kids and I don’t?”

“That’s really something you should talk to Don about.”

“Yeah, but, what if Will wanted kids and you didn’t?”

Mackenzie considers the question for a moment. “I don’t know. I guess we’d have to negotiate.”

“That’s kind of hard to do when you’re the uterus.”

Mackenzie laughs. “That’s true. I don’t know. I guess it doesn’t matter,” she lays a hand on her stomach. But it’s a good question. Mackenzie checks the time. “I’ve got to go.”

“So will I see you? Or?”

“I don’t know,” Mackenzie says, getting to her feet. She puts her empty soda cup in the trash. “I think my life will be pretty quiet next week. Or massively eventful.”

“I’ll try texting you,” Sloan says.

“Do,” Mackenzie agrees. “And you’ll come up and see us after the baby’s born?”

“I’d love that.”

Mackenzie steps forward to give her friend a hug. Around the shoulders because it’s basically impossible to get too close.

“Have fun,” Sloan says.

Mackenzie steps back to give her a frown.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.” She looks up at the banner. “Good luck?”

“I’ll take good luck,” Mackenzie says with a smile. “See you later,” she says, because ‘goodbye’ seems odd. Sloan echoes the sentiment and Mackenzie leaves her there in the conference room. She goes to find her husband. She figures he’ll be starting to get ready to go on the air about now. As she’s walking across the bullpen Jim stops her to ask if she’s going to stay for broadcast. She says no, confident that she’ll be able to leave the newsroom without having her husband have to escort her from the building before broadcast even begins. It shouldn’t feel like saying goodbye, but it does and she doesn’t want to engage in nostalgic behaviour when she has every intention of coming back in three months (she thinks).

She goes on to Will’s office but it’s empty. His bathroom door is pushed almost closed and light comes through the gap that is left. She pushes it open slowly, revealing a shirtless husband. He turns to her, startled, but relaxes when he sees it’s just her. Mackenzie comes in and pushes the door almost shut behind her again. She leans against the vanity while Will slips the shirt on. It’s white, as almost all his broadcast shirts are. “So, you said you were going to wear the cufflinks every night,” she says. Will turns to her as he does up the studs (not the studs Mackenzie got him for Christmas, which are silver to match the cuff links. These are white, so they don’t reflect the studio lights) by his belly button. “You got new shirts,” she answers herself, noticing the cuffs.

“I got new shirts,” Will confirms. He’s already changed his pants, so reaches for his tie and approaches where she’s leaning in front of the mirror. “You didn’t notice I was wearing them?”

“I don’t spend a lot of time looking at your sleeves while you’re broadcasting the news,” Mackenzie counters, while Will adjusts the lengths of his tie to the correct heights. “Nor does your suit jacket ride up enough to be able to see.”

Will abandons his tie and reaches for a clam-shell box on the counter instead. He pops it open and offers it to his wife. “Will you?” He asks.

“You shouldn’t have,” Mackenzie pretends to gasp surprise. She takes the box from him, and Will produces his right sleeve for her to fold back into place and fix with a cufflink. “Thank you for the send-off.”

“That was mostly the women in the office.”

“Uh huh,” Mackenzie muses, finishing and reaching for his other wrist. “But it was nice,” she looks up at him for a second. “No one said anything about me walking like a hippopotamus.”

Will looks away, to hide a wry grin.

“Thought so,” Mackenzie finishes with his other cuff. She doesn’t let his hand go though, instead she tugs on it, dragging his arm down so he lowers his shoulders and she can kiss him. “Did you threaten to break legs or?”

“Oh you know, threats of losing their jobs,” Will murmurs.

Mackenzie gives him a slow smile and lets his hand go. “I’m going to go home.”

“Ok,” Will says, turning to the mirror. He adjusts his tie again and starts forming the knot. “I’ll be along later.”

Mackenzie nudges him but he barely moves. “You know? I think Don and Sloan might be the next married.”

“What?” Will frowns at her.

“I just have a feeling.”

“Not Maggie and Jim?”

“They have further to go,” Mackenzie muses, snapping the clam-shell boxed closed and leaving it on the counter again. She studies her expression in the mirror and isn’t impressed. She looks over at her husband, who is adjusting his tie knot. “Very handsome,” she compliments.

Will gives her a smile and goes to retrieve his jacket. He tugs his shoes on and he’s ready.

“Walk me out?” Mackenzie asks.

“Love to.”


	14. Chapter 14

_26 th January 2014_

_Sunday_

_D-Day +1_

Mackenzie wakes because the baby pushes out all his limbs against her at the same time. Her heart pounds and she breaks out in a sweat, because at first she’s not sure what’s happening, and it just feels like her insides are being stretched beyond their limit. It’s due date plus one; one day over her due date and she’s as fed up with still being pregnant as the baby clearly is. It’s on her though. Her body decides when it’s time to go into labour. She goes through the laborious process of turning over in bed, shifting her hips, trying to move the pillow at the same time, trying not to tug the blanket off her husband completely (who sleeps with it to his chin) and disturb him. She can tell she’s bothered him from the way his breathing pattern changes. She tries to keep the moving to a minimum, but her hips get numb and she can’t sleep on her back or stomach.

It’s early. Actually, it’s late for her, but early for Will. The sun’s up. “Hey,” she whispers to her husband anyway.

“Hm?” He responds.

Aw, she feels bad for waking him. For about two seconds. “Can I get a hug?” She says softly.

He takes a moment to react, but then he picks himself up a little to shift closer to her. He bumps into her gently as he orientates and slumps more against her, than in a proper embrace. She’ll take it. He’s more than half asleep. She shifts a hand to the curve of his neck, then into his hair. “You ok?” He murmurs against her shoulder.

“Yeah. I just feel –” She doesn’t know how she feels. Restless and anxious and physically tired, but alert and emotional. Too many things all at once, and leaning on her husband helps ease it. That’s what she feels.

“You need anything or?”

“I just needed you, honey boo,” Mackenzie responds. Will gives a chuckle or a huff but he’s never said ‘stop’ to the nicknames.

Eventually, he wakes properly and gets up for the bathroom. He offers her breakfast in bed, but she doesn’t want to lay there anymore, and gets up with him. He puts socks on her feet for her and then makes her put her slippers on, so she doesn’t slip on the tiles in the kitchen. He makes tea and coffee. She makes eggs and toast. They sit at the dining table for the first time _ever_ and read online papers. They tidy up the kitchen together and then shower and get dressed. Mackenzie reminds Will that they have a Skype date with her parents in an hour so in the meantime she reads online, while Will practices his new songs on the guitar.

The laptop starts to ring and Mackenzie nudges Will with her toe. He stops playing immediately and looks at her and she indicates the ringing device on the coffee table. She moves to sit up properly and Will ditches the guitar and reaches for the computer for her. He puts it on his lap and answers the call, angling the camera so that it shows more of both of their faces, than Mackenzie’s large baby belly. It takes a second for the call to connect properly, and for the video feed on the other side to come up. Will recognises the kitchen behind the McHales as they come into view – they must be sitting at the kitchen table.

“Hi!” Mackenzie greets enthusiastically.

“Still no sign of him or her?” Anne asks.

“How are you?” John asks.

“Hi,” Will says.

“No sign,” Mackenzie confirms. “We’re good. How are you guys?”

“We’re good,” Anne answers. “It’s very mild here.”

“Oh yeah?” Mackenzie asks.

“No snow,” John explains.

“No snow,” Anne agrees.

“Very heavy rain,” John adds.

“It has rained very heavily,” Anne says.

“We’ve had some snow,” Mackenzie jumps in. “A few hours yesterday.”

“I hope you don’t have to go out in it,” Anne says.

“No we don’t need to go anywhere,” Mackenzie says, looking to Will a little.

“That’s good. I’m glad you’ve finished working,” Anne starts. Will hears Mackenzie give a soft sigh, but she forces a somewhat neutral expression for the camera. “You’d be too exhausted working that late.”

“I’m fine,” Mackenzie says, but Will knows better. He also knows there’s no way she’d let her parents see a sign of weakness. Or let them be right. “It was a short week anyway and now I can just be at home twiddling my thumbs, instead of having an extra week at home twiddling my thumbs.”

“Well, you get tired,” Anne says knowingly. “You need to be off your feet.”

“I’m off my feet,” Mackenzie promises, her tone a little sharper than before. “Will waits on me, hand and foot.”

“That’s good,” Anne gives a banal smile.

Will shifts in his seat, which causes the laptop to move a little, and their image in the camera window. He doesn’t know if that was a particular dig at him (has he not proven that he takes care of his wife?) but it sounded a little like one. She could, of course, have been reacting to her daughter’s tone. He changes the subject by asking after the rest of the family, so Anne informs them of what Mackenzie’s siblings have been up to, and then her nieces and nephews; illness, school and work. It gets everyone talking more smoothly.

When Mackenzie excuses herself to the bathroom, Will wonders if her parents will end the call. But they don’t, and just as he’s trying to think of something else to make conversation with, John asks him about the Superbowl.

“Ah yeah, next weekend,” Will responds. “Seattle Seahawks and Denver Broncos.”

“Who do you think will take it out?” John asks.

“Uh, probably the Broncos,” Will says. He’s not going to get into why. He knows this is polite conversation and he appreciates that his father-in-law is making the effort. “The teams are arriving in town tomorrow.”

“Are they touring before the game?” Anne asks. John explains to her that they’re playing in the city. “They’re playing in New York?” Anne asks, surprised.

“New Jersey,” Will corrects. “Shared hosting. They’re building a fan zone down on Broadway.”

“Is that near you?” Anne asks.

“No,” Will answers. “It’s closer to work than here.”

“Will you go take a look?” Anne asks.

“Maybe,” Will hedges. It really depends what’s going on with his son’s birth. He’s loathe to stray too far from home and a crowded fan zone doesn’t sound like a place he can get out of easily if Mackenzie needs him.

“I heard there’s some concern with the stadium,” John pipes up again.

“Uh, yeah, it’s open to the air so people are worried about it snowing.”

“Will they play in the snow?” Anne asks.

“That’s – I’m honestly not sure,” Will responds. “I think it would depend on how heavy the snow fall is.”

“Is it going to snow?” Anne queries.

“That’s a good question,” Will answers with a slight chuckle.

“What’s a good question?” Mackenzie asks, coming back into the room.

“Whether it will snow during the Superbowl,” Will answers her.

“Right. Million dollar question?”

Will lifts the laptop so she can take her seat again and readjusts the angle of the camera so her face is mostly in the shot and not her breasts. “Oh honey,” Mackenzie turns to him. “Would you make me a cup of tea?”

“Sure,” Will agrees. He hands the computer to her and she rests it on the bump while he makes an exit. A strategically planned exit. He said hello. He made small talk. He is now off the hook. He goes to the kitchen and sets water to boil, slowing getting out a mug and selecting a tea bag. He writes a shopping list, while he’s hiding in the kitchen, and puts it through to be delivered tomorrow. Then he pours water from the long boiled jug and finally makes the tea. He takes it back through to his wife and she thanks him with a smile.

“We were just about to say goodbye,” Mackenzie says lightly.

“Oh,” Will slides carefully onto the couch again. He leans in to say goodbye to his in-laws and they say goodbye as well. Mackenzie says her goodbyes and promises to let them know if anything happens with the baby, and then signs off. “Are you going to let them know when you go into labour?” Will asks lightly, putting the laptop on the coffee table.

“No,” Mackenzie scoffs.

 

 

**********

 

_27 th January 2014_

_Monday_

_D-Day +2_

Will half dreams he’s swimming in the air, about three feet off the ground, and then he’s aware that he’s still in bed, and the dream fades and he can’t remember what he was thinking about. But he’s awake and he wonders if Mackenzie is still in bed, and what the time is. He strays a foot over to her side but before he can connect with anything solid, she says good morning to him.

“Fuck,” he jumps.

Mackenzie laughs lightly. “Were you expecting me to be up?”

“No,” Will croaks, prying his eyes open. “I don’t know.” His heart is pounding and the room is dim. But the sun is coming up and so he pushes himself up off his back to check the time. Eight thirty. He hasn’t slept in, particularly, but it feels later than it should be. He turns over to his hip, burying his face in his pillow.

“You’re not much of a morning person, huh?” Mackenzie muses.

“You’re just figuring that out now?” Will mutters into his pillow, but his tone is not snide.

Mackenzie gives a slight chuckle. “Want me to make you some coffee?”

“No,” Will lifts his head. “Don’t get up. I can make it.” He sees his wife laying facing him, her eyes bright and attentive. She looks well-rested. “Did you sleep ok?”

“I did, aside from the baby on my bladder.”

Will shifts his head so he’s on his pillow, but isn’t suffocating himself. He closes his eyes again. “I didn’t notice you got up.”

“I was very careful.”

“Hm.”

“I figure, we should selfishly get as much sleep as we can, instead of depriving ourselves for solidarity.”

Will’s not sure what that means. He’s not really quite awake yet. He has to admit, he feels better for getting solid sleep. He’s doing better these days, with getting to sleep in a reasonable amount of time (instead of lying in bed awake for hours), and he knows a regular sleep cycle is important for his mental health. But this is the first week he’s not going to see his therapist in a long time and he has a baby about to be born any day. Mackenzie’s probably right. He should probably take advantage of getting enough sleep whenever he can.

“You’re no good to me if you’re dozy.”

“Mm,” Will agrees and opens his eyes to look at his wife again. He figures nothing is happening in regards to labour, otherwise she’d say. He’d expect her to say. “I do expect you to wake me if you’re in labour though.”

“Of course. It’s not something I particularly want to experience on my own.”

Will yawns.

“And you’re supposed to be my pain relief,” Mackenzie adds.

“Mm,” Will agrees.

“You’re basically my total support network,” Mackenzie goes on lightly, but her eyes are intense on his and even though he still feels sleepy, he’s awake to know that she’s woken nervous again.

“Of course,” he says, sliding a hand over the mattress towards her. She takes his fingers and holds them tightly. She’s almost his too. This week, he foregoes Habib.

“So what do you usually do in the morning?” Mackenzie asks brightly.

“Not much,” Will responds.


	15. Chapter 15

It’s a strange thing, to have Mackenzie kiss him goodbye at the door mid-morning, and to go off to work, leaving her at home. It was strange having her there while he showered and got ready for work. Sharing breakfast with her and hanging out made it feel like the weekend. And when Will gets to work it feels different. It hits him a little that she’s not there and it takes him back to a time when he didn’t know which country she was in, and was doing a masterful job in pretending that he also didn’t care. Most of the time, he had himself convinced. Most of the time, he didn’t think about her.

Will goes to his office and Kelli follows him in. “Morning brief,” she greets, handing it over.

“Thanks,” Will takes it. “Is Minahan here yet?”

“I don’t know. He hasn’t come down to the newsroom so far.”

“Thanks,” Will says again and Kelli leaves. Then there’s that. He has to get used to another new news director. It makes him feel unsettled, but he can’t do anything about it. If anything, he’s determined to make sure everything goes smoothly while Mackenzie is gone, so she doesn’t worry about it from the couch (where he hopes she is resting). Will scans the news, but nothing stands out. Should be a pretty straight forward show tonight.

He leaves his office again to find Jim. He hasn’t seen Minahan either, but met him once and he seems like a good guy. “You can understand why I’m wary of anyone coming up from DC,” Will says.

“Yeah,” Jim agrees. “But Mackenzie trusts him.”

That does it. Will nods and leaves again. True. If Mackenzie trusts him…

 

 

**********

 

Will’s entire normality is way out of whack. Mackenzie is not upstairs to visit, or send lunch up to. Nor is she there for dinner. Will can’t remember how he used to have his evening meal before he started meeting her for dinner. Did he go out? Order take-out? Did he go home? He could go home now, for dinner, but by the time he gets there it will just about be time to come back. He opts for eating take-out at his desk by himself. Most of the staff leave early in the afternoon to take their dinner break, but Will eats when they’re all back, loud in the bullpen as they get ready for broadcast.

He wonders if he should have organised his wife’s dinner. Not to be over involved, but he’s been doing it so long now… He wonders if she would have cooked. Or ordered in. And then he wonders no more and just calls her.

“Hi,” Mackenzie greets him almost instantly.

“Hi,” Will responds, sticking another fry in his mouth.

There’s a little pause of silence where he realises she’s waiting for him to speak up about why he called, and that he doesn’t know why he called.

“You missed me,” Mackenzie accuses.

“I was just – yeah,” he admits. “I’m having dinner and you’re not here and that’s very strange.”

He hears Mackenzie give a light laugh. “I already ate. But what have you got? You could tempt me to more.”

“Cheeseburger,” Will confesses.

“Pass,” Mackenzie says.

“What did you have?” He takes another bite of the burger, small though, so he can chew faster.

“I couldn’t be bothered cooking, so I had toast.”

“Mackenzie,” Will complains, speaking around meat and bread.

“I had a proper lunch.”

“Do I need to leave you MRE’s?”

Mackenzie gives a slight laugh again. “No. Maybe. I love that you know what an MRE is. Hey, how was it with Josh?”

“Are you trying to change the subject?” Will swallows.

“Uh huh. Go with it.”

Will chews a fry. “It was fine.”

“Light news day?”

“Yeah,” Will confirms. “But also, we don’t need hand holding.”

Mackenzie laughs again and Will smiles. She sounds like she’s in a good mood. And given he’s had no emergency phone calls or texts to come home immediately, there must not be anything going on baby-wise. He feels like there could be a good chance he might start harassing her if he asks too often (like last year, when they first found out she was pregnant, and he obsessively asked her if she was feeling ok), so he refrains from asking her if she’s in labour at all.

“Of course you don’t,” she says breathily into the phone and Will feels a pull of his stomach. He misses that husky voice of hers in his ear, slightly distorted by the advent of microphones. “And I have total faith that you won’t screw everything up while I’m gone.”

“I’m sure you’re talking about everyone else and not me,” Will counters, putting the last of his burger in his mouth.

“Of course, though, I still have that copy of Don Quixote at hand if need be.”

Will smiles as he chews, brushing bread from his fingers. He tosses his trash in the bin and swallows his mouthful. “What were you doing today?”

“Nothing,” Mackenzie says, her tone coy. Will wonders if she’s been doing something she shouldn’t. If he comes home to find she’s moved the furniture around, he’s going to have a fit. “I’ve been completely lazy all day,” she elaborates and Will calls off the lynch mob. She makes a noise down the line that has Will’s heart pounding a little. She’s stretching, but it sounds deliciously intimate in his ear.

They stay on the phone while Will changes for broadcast, Mackenzie’s voice echoing in the bathroom slightly while on speaker. She teases him about getting a webcam so she can enjoy the strip show. He reminds her that out of the two of them, he’s not the one who’s indulged in a little strip tease. She’s silent and he wishes he could see her face and then she comes back with a very intimate: “That was just for you.”

It’s like a sucker punch, her tone, and the way her voice whispers, the intimate way she’s said it, and the way it takes him back to that night. Years ago, when they were dating the first time. She was so fucking sexy and fun and young and it made him feel like a king. He was so achingly in love with her and pretending he wasn’t, because she was fighting her feelings for him every step of the way. From day one. He wanted more and he pushed her gently for it and even though he could see she was scared, she never said no to him. (He doesn’t think about how he might have pushed her for something she didn’t want, and that’s why she was still with Brian. He doesn’t think about it in that way at all. He didn’t ask her if she would be just his when he wanted to. That was his mistake.)

Will clears his throat. “That was a great night,” he manages and Mackenzie gives a carefree laugh. “It was,” she agrees. “Of course, you still owe me.”

“You really don’t want to see me –”

“Shake your arse?” Mackenzie cuts in.

Will grabs his phone. “You’re still on speaker!”

Mackenzie laughs again. “Well take me off.”

Will holds his phone to his ear and leaves his bathroom, carrying his shoes. His tie is draped around his neck. His office is empty though. No one has snuck in to hear his wife making insinuations down the phone.

“You’re a great dancer,” Mackenzie says. “Will?”

“I’m here.”

“You’re a great dancer,” she repeats, gently.

“Formal dancing yeah,” he concedes, dropping to his office chair. He can’t remember the last time they talked on the phone like this. Just talked.

“I dunno. You do ok with shaking your booty too.”

Will smiles at that memory too. He only went dancing because she invited him. 

“And, I also enjoy seeing you naked, seeing you take your clothes off, and being teased by you. So there are really only good points to strip teasing.”

Will feels like he’s blushing.

She’s still young and fun and sexy and he’s still so achingly in love with her.

“You should go,” Mackenzie announces.  

“Yeah,” Will agrees. He has to finish getting ready and making sure the show is ready to go.

“I’ll see you later.”

“Don’t wait up, if you don’t want,” he offers.

“I napped this afternoon, so, I’ll wait up.”

“Love you,” Will says.

“Me too,” Mackenzie responds, and cuts the call.

 

 

**********

 

When Will gets home, he finds Mackenzie in bed asleep, with the light on and ACN on and a book in her hand, glasses on as well. So he leaves her there (though he does gently take the book from her hand – and steals it to read himself), and goes to the living room to play his guitar softly. He’s doing pretty well with all the basic nursery rhymes, and has picked up a few Wiggles songs relatively easily as well. According to the books they’re reading now, about what babies lives will be like for the first year, they really enjoy singing (being sung to), but his guitar skills probably won’t be appreciated for a while (he does wonder if it will be too loud). He’s also learnt that the baby’s stomach will be about the size of a cherry, and that it could take an hour at feeding time to fill it.

An hour.

He never would have known that before all of this. But then that’s true of anything. He didn’t know much about the law until he studied to be a lawyer. He learnt a lot about pregnancy and giving birth, because that’s about to happen, and he knows quite a bit about taking care of a baby, now that he’s having one (it’ll be a different thing to do it. Not unlike practicing law is different from studying law). He wonders how Gideon is doing. He hasn’t heard from his friend in a while.

“Hey,” Mackenzie says softly from the doorway.

“Hi,” Will whispers back.

“I wake up and Right Now’s ending but you’re not in bed.”

“I was,” he gestures to the sheet music in front of him, even though he wasn’t playing that moment.

“You’re going to stay up a little longer?”

“No, I’ll come to bed,” Will says, closing the book. He gets up and puts the guitar back on its stand and then goes to where his wife is waiting for him. It feels like she’s being clingy, and it feels just the slightest little bit claustrophobic for him. But, she’s pregnant, which means she’s highly emotionally vulnerable right now, and that means it brings out the worst in the behaviours he likes the least, and it also means that he can take an even bigger chill pill, and try to ease her stress burden as much as possible.

That’s what he’s learnt this year.


	16. Chapter 16

_28 th January 2014_

_Tuesday_

_D-Day +3_

Will’s just leaving the pitch meeting just before midday when his Blackberry starts ringing. He takes it out of his pocket as he heads across the bullpen to his office, and sees Mackenzie’s name on the screen. His heart starts to pound as he wonders if _this is it_. Every text or call elicits the same response. Every time he sees her, he wants to ask. She’s three days overdue and he’s wondering when it’s going to happen: when is she going to go into labour? (And every time he sees someone on the staff, there’s a look in their eye that’s asking him the same thing – their pool is starting to dry up fast.)

“Hey,” Will greets, as he gets to his office. He pushes the door open to go in and drops his folder on his desk top.

“She wants to induce me!”

“What?”

“She says if I don’t go into labour by the weekend, then she wants to induce me. She thinks the baby’s too big and my blood pressure is up and she doesn’t want me to go over too much longer.”

“Wait, what?” Will asks again, trying to digest the deluge of information.

“Are you listening?” Mackenzie asks, her tone entirely unpleasant. It raises Will’s heckles hard and he stands in the middle of his office floor, hand on his hip, phone pressed to his ear. His heart is uncomfortable for a different reason now and he feels stupid for not immediately comprehending what she’s talking about. “I said she wants to induce me. That means I’ll have to be injected with these chemicals…”

Will fades out on listening for a moment. He knows what induction means and what it involves (they covered all of that in the childbirth classes _and_ the multitude of books _and_ at his Daddy Bootcamp thing). He hates her tone. He takes a moment to let her rant and to remind himself that she’s stressed and when she’s stressed, he has to be zen; extra zen. He is supposed to be in charge of morale during the pregnancy (he hasn’t done an entirely good job of it). Actually, he should probably listen in case there are details in there that he really should pay attention to, like an admission date or something. “Honey?” He cuts in, his tone _uber_ gentle.

“What?” Mackenzie asks sharply. But he recognises something else in that tone. She’s crying. A little. She’s upset.

“Where are you?”

“I’m –” Mackenzie hesitates. “I’m waiting for the car.”

So, she’s not home yet.

“Do you want to meet me?”

“You’re working.”

“I can take fifteen minutes.”

“No, everyone will be there,” she sighs.

“I can come downstairs. Meet you in the lobby.”

“No,” she says again, her voice small. “It’s ok. I’m ok.”

“You sure?” Will asks softly.

“Yes,” she says. “No. I don’t know. The car’s here.”

“Call me when you get home,” Will requests.

“I’m fine.”

“Call me back,” Will says again.

“Ok, I’ll ring you,” Mackenzie agrees. He hears her greet the driver before she ends the call and he removes his phone from his ear. He stares out of his office window for a moment, not sure how well he did in calming her down. He goes to his desk and draws his folder towards him. It shouldn’t take her long to get home. Maybe twenty minutes. He checks his watch, notes the time, decides what time he’ll call her, if she doesn’t call him. He opens his folder, preparing to look –

She wouldn’t do something stupid like try to induce labour herself would she?

 

 

**********

 

He waits a very painful twenty minutes and when she doesn’t call him, he calls her. Her phone rings five times (yeah, he’s counting) and when she answers, she sounds breathless.

“What happened?” Will asks.

“My phone was in my bag. I just got in.”

“I meant with Katherine.”

“Oh. She’s just – it was a normal check-up, the baby’s fine, but she said my blood pressure’s up and given the size of the baby, she doesn’t want to let me go over too much.”

Will listens carefully to his wife’s tone. She sounds better, but still, there’s a tightness to it. He taps a pen against his blotter, wanting to smoke. He really wants to smoke right now. “I’ll come home,” Will says.

“No!” Mackenzie protests. “Don’t do that. I’m fine.”

“You don’t sound fine.”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Mackenzie says again, but now it sounds like she’s crying properly. She gives a weak sob. “Really,” she tries.

Will stands and paces to his windows, looking out on the city. “Mackenzie,” he says gently.

“I don’t want to be induced. I want it just happen how it’s supposed to happen!”

“I understand,” Will says, because he doesn’t know what else to say. He doesn’t want to just leave work at short notice for something that’s not the actual birth. If he leaves, it puts pressure on the rest of the staff to cover him, and if he doesn’t broadcast tonight, Sloan will probably have to come in and do it (she volunteered to cover Elliott for the week Will will take off, so that Elliott can cover Will, and they don’t have to bring Jane Barrow up from DC – nobody wants to bring Jane Barrow up from DC). And if he’s going to inconvenience everyone, he wants it to be because his son is actually about to be born. He’s not entitled to leave, because he and Mackenzie happen to work in the same organisation, which means only one of them can take it, and it seems logical that it would be the person actually, physically, having a baby. When the baby is actually born, Will will have to take sick leave. And if he takes any more time off after that runs out, then it will be unpaid leave. Not that that matters to him. He won’t miss the income. That will be just fine. What’s not fine, is that someone will have to move their life around to accommodate him.

“This isn’t going how I wanted it to,” Mackenzie says.

“We knew that was a possibility,” Will points out gently. “We can plan all we want but that doesn’t mean it will go that way.”

“I know,” Mackenzie says tightly.

He wants to tell her to relax but suspects that would be a mistake. He shouldn’t minimise how she feels right now. He needs to listen, and empathise, and reassure her.

“It will be ok,” Will says. “Even if you’re induced, it will be ok. No harm to you or the baby.”

“Yeah,” Mackenzie says quietly. “I know.”

Will gives a silent wince. He’s not sure how he’s doing with this one. He’d really like to hold her. He tells her that and Mackenzie gives a huff of a laugh. “That would be nice,” she admits. “But you have to work.”

She’s worried about his leave too.

“I’ll come home for dinner,” Will says. And before she interrupts him to protest, he insists that he will. It’s really not far. “I’ll pick something up along the way.”

“Ok,” Mackenzie doesn’t argue again.

They’re silent a moment.

“When does she want to induce you?” Will asks.

“Saturday,” Mackenzie answers in a tiny voice.

“There’s still time,” Will responds.

 

 

**********

 

Will calls down to the Thai place Mackenzie likes, and puts in an order, saying he’ll be there in five minutes to pick it up. Then he goes to find Jim in his office to say he’s going home for dinner.

“Oh ok,” Jim says. “Is?”

“No,” Will quickly allays. “No, I just want to check up on her.”

“Ok, well say hi,” Jim says.

“Sure,” Will agrees. “I’ll be back in an hour.”

“No problem,” Jim adds, as Will walks out the door. Tess stops him as he’s heading across the bullpen, querying him on where he’s going, and when he says ‘home’, she loudly asks if Mackenzie has gone into labour.

“Jesus,” Will mutters. “No, Mackenzie has not gone into labour,” he raises his voice to announce it to the room. “I’m just going home to have dinner with my wife, ok?”

“Sorry,” Tess murmurs.

Will walks away and heads downstairs. He walks around the corner, his chin tucked into his coat to stave off the cold. It’s just after five and the sun is still up, technically, but the tall buildings of New York cast intimidating shadows and Will walks quickly. His food is ready and he heads back onto the street in short time. He strides back up the block, a slight back track, and then starts walking home. Quickly. Because it’s cold and because he doesn’t have a lot of time. He makes the twenty-minute walk in fifteen (walking against the cross walks when he can), and arrives at their building hot. The doorman gives Will a surprised expression when he comes in. “Is this it?” He asks.

Will shakes his head. “No, just dinner,” he raises the plastic carry bag as he goes across the lobby, unbuttoning his coat as he does so. The elevator is there, so the doors ping open immediately and he steps in.

The apartment is cool when Will gets in but he’s still warm. He’s taking off his coat when Mackenzie emerges from the kitchen. “I text you,” she greets.

“I didn’t hear it,” Will answers, hooking his coat. He stoops to pick up the food and hands it to his wife, then takes out his phone to see what she said.

 

**I’m fine. You really**

**don’t need to come**

**home.**

He frowns at the message, which Mackenzie doesn’t see, because she’s turned to get plates. Is she mad at him for coming home then? He texts back quickly and pockets his phone.

 

**See you stop me.**

Mackenzie puts the plates on the bench and he steps in to get cutlery while she opens containers of rice and beef. She doesn’t say anything as he gives her a fork to divvy up the food, and she doesn’t retrieve her phone from some hidden place on her body (so Will figures it’s somewhere else). He moves closer to her and puts his arm around her shoulder, then stoops to press a kiss against the side of her head. She smells nice. He feels her lean her weight on him a little – she might not be so mad after all.

They eat, and they don’t talk about the induction. Will does ask if everything else with her appointment was ok and she nods that it was. The baby’s fine; his heartbeat strong. Will senses she doesn’t want to talk about it, which is unusual for her. He thinks about what he can do to make it ok again. She looks too wary for baths and naked massaging.

Will clears their plates once they’re done and tidies up the kitchen, putting the left overs in the fridge for Mackenzie’s lunch tomorrow (MRE provided – so long as she eats it then. It won’t be safe to eat the next day). He puts the dishes on and then goes back to his wife. He needs to head back to the office, even though he doesn’t want to, even though it feels like a weekend and like he should be allowed to bug out on the couch doing nothing but rubbing his wife’s feet.

Mackenzie’s stretched out on the couch cushions, on her side, facing the TV, which is on to CBS. He doesn’t know what she’s watching but when he comes in she mutes it and looks at him, following him with her eyes as he comes to sit on the coffee table opposite her. “I gotta go,” he says.

“Ok,” she responds.

“What can I do for you?” He asks.

“Nothing.”

He moves to kneel on the floor, so he can get face to face with her. “What can I do?” He asks again, his tone gentle.  

Tears well up in Mackenzie’s eyes, and she moves a hand to cup his cheek. “Nothing, honey, I’m fine,” she says, her dark eyes watery and unconvincing. “It just caught me off guard.”

Will nods lightly. “Anything at all, name it.”

Mackenzie gives a wavering smile as she thinks. “I’d love to go swimming,” she comes up with.

Will leans forward to give her a soft kiss. She thinks he won’t be able to make that happen, in the middle of a New York winter. But watch him.

“Don’t wait up,” he warns as he struggles to get to his feet again.

“Stop sitting on the floor,” Mackenzie admonishes.

 

 

**********

 

**I doubt I could if**

**I even tried.**

Is the message Will receives when he gets back to the office. The newsroom is in full swing as they nudge closer to broadcast, getting those last minute details right. He lets Jim know that he’s back, and then goes to his office to cool down from his brisk walk back to work, before he changes for the show. In that time, he finds a swimming pool. And then, on a second thought, he finds something for Mackenzie to wear (figuring she might not be so keen on the bikini anymore. Not after the complaints about stretch marks, the prominence of her veins, and the dark line that runs down her belly, from breast to pubic bone). Maternity swimwear, he’s not wrong, it’s a thing, and orders her a one piece. Tomorrow, he’s going to take her swimming.

 

 

**********

 

Will lets himself into the apartment and it’s quiet. He can’t hear if a television is on and he doesn’t call out to his wife, in case she’s asleep. He takes off his coat and leaves his bag by the door, and treads carefully down the hall, sticking his head into the living room on his way by, to see if she’s there on the couch. She is not. She’s in bed. Asleep, like last night. Except this time, Will takes his shoes off in the wardrobe and then climbs onto the bed behind her. He shifts so he’s close against her back and slowly drapes an arm over her side to embrace her gently. She stirs. “Hey.”

“Hi,” Will whispers back, resting his head on her pillow, behind her head. Mackenzie moves her arm, so she can take his fingers, but her grip is loose, and he’ll be able to extricate himself later. He’s here so she knows he’s come home. So she’ll, hopefully, sleep deeply, and not keep an ear out for him. He’s not sleepy; it’s not time for him to come to bed. But he doesn’t mind laying here with his wife for a while, to give her some peace of mind.

“I’m ready,” Mackenzie says, and Will wonders what she’s talking about. “You know? Everything’s ready. All the furniture’s in the baby’s room, and the hospital bag is packed. We did the classes and read the books and timed the route to the hospital. We’ve got nappies and wipes and bottles and clothes and a carry pod and a bassinet. My leave is sorted; _your_ leave is sorted.” She pauses. “Why isn’t he here yet?”

Will tightens his arm around her a little. “I don’t know,” he murmurs. He lifts his head to press a kiss to the back of her shoulder. From that vantage point he can see her eyes are still closed, but there’s a frown creasing her forehead. “He’ll be here soon,” he attempts optimism, but he understands her frustration. Actually, no he doesn’t. He’s not pregnant. He doesn’t know what that’s like. He understands that she _is_ frustrated. He _can_ comprehend that. But he doesn’t know what she’s going through.


	17. Chapter 17

_29 th January 2014_

_Wednesday_

_D-Day +4_

Will wakes, feeling pretty well rested. After he was sure Mackenzie had gone back to sleep, he got up again and got ready for bed. But Mackenzie didn’t call out for him, so he went to the living room to read one of the baby books, reminding himself of a few details about the birth, and what it might be like with his new born son. After an hour he goes to bed anyway and falls asleep almost straight away. So when he wakes the next morning, he feels good, and when he checks the time, it’s eight o’clock on the dot. He turns over to see if Mackenzie’s awake. She’s not even in bed.

Will sits up and picks the sleep from his eyes. He goes to the curtains and pulls them back, and then goes to the wardrobe to get socks for his feet and a sweater.

“Will?”

“Yeah?” He calls back and emerges, socks in hand. Mackenzie is standing by the bathroom doorway. She gives him a slight smile. “How are you this morning?” He asks, stooping to put his socks on.

“I feel ok, I guess. A little embarrassed about yesterday.”

Will looks up at his wife, surprised, and loses his balance. He slams his foot to the ground, sock on his toes only. “Embarrassed about what?” He fixes the sock and goes to where she’s still standing.

She doesn’t meet his eye.

“Nothing to be embarrassed about honey,” he says softly. “It’s a tough time at the moment.”

“Hm,” she hums, noncommitting.

“Hey, so, I have a surprise for you,” Will changes the subject, placing his hands on his wife’s arms.

She looks up at him. “What is it?” She sounds wary.

“We’re going swimming.”

“What?” She half frowns, half laughs. “In winter?”

“There are all season pools in New York,” Will tells her, moving away again to get his sweater. “You just have to look for them.” When he comes back, Mackenzie is tugging her corner of the bedspread into place.

“Really?” She asks, sceptical.

“I promise you, it will be amazing,” Will says, and then tugs his sweater on.

“I don’t have anything to wear,” Mackenzie pouts at him once his face is back in view.

“I’ve got it covered,” he says, going to her. He puts his hands on her arms again, stooping a little to make her meet his eye. She looks up at him, and she looks tired. She looks a little defeated. So she’s not a box of fluffy ducks this morning. “Do you trust me?”

“Completely.”

“This will be good,” Will promises. Then he takes her hand and leads her to the kitchen for breakfast.

 

 

**********

 

Toast and tea (and coffee) for breakfast. After that, Will packs a bag with changes of underwear. Mackenzie sits on the bed and reminds him to put in towels, but they won’t need them. She requests her shampoo but he tells her there’ll be shampoo there. She frowns at him. “What the hell kind of swimming pool are we going to?”

“You’ll see,” Will says, going to get his swimming trunks.

“I’ll need moisturiser,” Mackenzie calls to him.

Will shakes his head as he emerges from the walk in robe. He tucks the shorts into the backpack. “They’ll probably have that too.”

Mackenzie squints at him. “Flip flops?” She tries. “For walking around the pool?”

“Sure,” Will agrees and goes to retrieve both pairs. That’s a really good idea. Doesn’t want his wife to slip. He tucks them into the backpack. “Anything else?”

“I’d hardly know,” Mackenzie says.

Will gives her a slight smile. “Let’s go.”

“Wait! I don’t have a swimsuit.”

“I’ve got that covered.”

Mackenzie gets off the bed. “Are we swimming nude?”

Will gives a slight grin. “As fun as that sounds, we might get kicked out.”

“So, it’s a public pool?” She approaches where he’s waiting by the door.

“Sort of,” Will twists his mouth, and walks into the hallway.

 

 

**********

 

The Mandarin Oriental Hotel in New York has an all seasons, indoor pool, thirty-six stories above New York City, looking out on Central Park. It’s not, technically, open to the public, but it is to hotel guests, so Will gets around that by simply paying for a room. It’s five minutes up the road from them, but Will doesn’t want Mackenzie to walk that far (it’s several blocks after all). Picking up the courier package of the swimsuit he had overnighted on their way through their building’s lobby, Will puts it in his backpack and refuses to tell Mackenzie what it is. She pesters him in the car and guesses anyway and then she wants to see it. He caves and lets her have the package, but it’s sealed nice and tight and she struggles to get into it. She’s still trying as he checks them into their room.

“Come on,” Will takes her wrist to direct her towards the elevators.

An older woman is waiting already and they share polite smiles. The doors open and they go in, Will waiting for the other woman to go first. She stands in the corner, so Will stands in the middle, and Mackenzie on his other side. She pushes the button for the forty-fifth floor and they start to ride up in silence.

“When are you due?” The woman asks Mackenzie.

“Soon,” she responds with a tight smile.

“Well you know, you shouldn’t have sex otherwise you might go into labour early,” she says knowingly.

“You know what Will?” Mackenzie immediately looks up at him. “I think we should go up to our room right now and have vigorous sex. See if we can’t just jiggle him on out of there immediately? What do you think?”

Will’s too surprised to answer. The elevator stops at the twenty-first floor, and the woman gets off, a shocked expression on her face. A young guy gets on, large headphones covering his ears and the faint hint of rock music emanating from his head. The doors close again.

“I don’t think that was her floor,” Will says.

Mackenzie laughs.

“That was rather harsh,” he adds.

“I’m so sick of people giving me advice! And asking me when I’m due. And touching my stomach like it’s not part of my personal space,” Mackenzie rants.

The young guy next to them starts nodding his head in time with his music.

Will puts his arm around Mackenzie’s shoulder and draws her against him. “Ok, ok,” he soothes. The elevator stops again on the thirty-sixth floor, and the young guy gets out. They go up to the forty-fifth and after Will lets them into the room, Mackenzie turns to him with a frown. “Hang on, I thought we were swimming?”

“We are,” Will moves around her, to put the bag on the bed.

“Then what are we doing here?”

Will goes to her and takes the still wrapped package from her. “The pool is only open to hotel guests.”

“So you booked a room?”

“Yeah,” Will says from the desk. He’s looking for scissors.

“Will. You paid for a room just so I could swim?”

“Yeah,” he says, opening drawers. Maybe he should have asked the front desk to open the package, even though it was funny watching Mackenzie try with her fingernails.

“Will,” Mackenzie says again and he looks up. She’s got that adoration face on, the one that can’t believe he’s done something sweet for her. “This is a nice room.”

“Yeah,” Will looks around. It _is_ nice. It should be. “It’s the premium Central Park something. I don’t know.” It’s decorated in Japanese cherry oak with a 1940s feel. “The bed linens are exclusive,” he remembers from the website. He didn’t really care what room they were in. The room isn’t the point.

“Did you pay a small fortune for this room?” Mackenzie asks carefully.

“Ah,” Will goes back to his hunt for scissors. Or a knife. “Not really.”

Mackenzie approaches where he’s searching and lifts scissors from the desktop and hands them to him. He takes them, a little sheepish. “That view though,” Mackenzie says quietly and walks around him to take a closer look. They’re on Columbus Circle, so look right down into the park. “Can you imagine fucking me against that backdrop?”

Will just about cuts his hand. He looks over at his wife and she looks at him, her face completely serious.

“I’d look phenomenal against that,” she gestures widely with her hands, framing up the shot.

She would. It’s a similar view to what they have at home, but the difference is, they don’t have floor to ceiling windows.

“We could do that sometime,” Will says, picturing her naked and riding him and he remembers that it’s been a while.

“Maybe for our anniversary,” Mackenzie muses and comes to stand in front of him again. “Put the scissors down,” she directs and as he leans to do so, she takes the now open package from him. She takes out the maternity swimwear (plain black. He didn’t want to risk guessing colour or pattern) and gives him the rubbish back.

He stoops to put it in the trash under the desk. “You know, the really premium rooms have corner views,” he says but Mackenzie isn’t listening.

“How did you know what size I am?”

“It said, your normal size, so I got small.”

Mackenzie narrows her eyes at him slightly. “What makes you think I’m brave enough to wear this in public?”

“Because you’re not afraid of anything, except jellyfish,” Will tells her. “Which is perfectly normal.”

“Everyone will look at me,” she pouts.

“Honey, if you don’t want to swim we don’t have to swim. Have you seen the bath?” He moves around her and goes to the bathroom they walked right by on their way in. He flips the lights. “It’s a massive bath,” he goes in to check it out and knows Mackenzie will follow him. She comes to lean against the door frame. “You could just about swim in it.”

She gives him a slight smile. “Let’s go swimming,” she says.


	18. Chapter 18

They head down to the pool in the terry cloth robes provided in the rooms, their swimsuits and flip flops. Aside from a pool attendant, who brings over towels when they come in, there is one other person in the pool, and it’s not the young guy from the elevator before. It’s an older man swimming laps. Will wants to say to Mackenzie ‘see? No one’s even here to see you in your swimsuit’ but he’s sworn off ‘I told you so’s’ until at least after the baby’s born, maybe even longer.

The view from the pool is of the Hudson River and at night, with all the buildings lit up around them, it would really be something else. All the same, having a swim thirty-six stories up, while New York is a flurry of activity is pretty amazing. Even Will has to admit it’s pretty cool, as he slides into the heated water. It’s three feet deep where they get in, so he squats to get the water to his chin, then stands at his full height again to help his wife into the water. She’s using the ladder, but it’s trickier with her belly. She jumps off the last step, splashing into the water gracelessly, but she looks happy as she treads water on her back for a moment, before standing again.

“Fuck, I feel completely weightless,” she says as she pushes forward to swim towards him. She might be weightless, but her balance is not great, even in the water. She stands before she sinks and goes back to treading water on her back. Will crouches in the water again, watching her swim around. She looks joyful. He hasn’t seen that in a while. He moves towards her, and hooks his arms under her shoulders. “Hey,” she startles until she sees that when he holds her like that, she doesn’t have to expend energy on keeping herself afloat at all. She leans back against him and he crouches a little as he starts walking backwards down the length of the pool. The deep end only gets to four feet, so it’s not a stretch for him, and Mackenzie just lays in the water, letting him do all the work. The top of her belly sticks up above the water, and he doesn’t care what she thinks, he thinks she looks gorgeous with her baby belly.

“This was the best idea,” Mackenzie says, tilting her head back to meet his eye, her hair getting completely wet.

“It was your idea.”

“I didn’t think you’d take it seriously.”

“Well,” Will gives a shrug of his mouth. She should know better.

“If I asked you to take me to the moon, would you do it?”

“I think space travel might be slightly outside of my financial capabilities. But I could give you an upper atmosphere space flight. Maybe not right now, though. Or I could get you a moon rock? Get a crater on the moon named after you?”

She gives him the adoration frown again. It’s a cross between being pleased, proud of him, and adoring him, but slightly concerned that he’s done something too sweet; that he’s too much. He looks down at her, waiting for the next bit. He doesn’t care about how much he spent on the room, because this is all worth it. It’s not about the money, it’s about what he can do with it. It’s about how he can use it to make his wife happy. And it’s not the money that makes his wife happy, it’s the opportunities the money affords. He honestly didn’t care about money before now. He was glad to have a nice apartment, that he could live in alone, and that he could travel if the whim hit him (which it hardly did). He bought things he really coveted, like his guitars and the nice clothes. Things he didn’t have growing up, when one pair of shoes had to last a year, even if he grew out of them. Nice restaurants were fun for a while, but not as entertaining without someone to share them with. The security was more important and he spent nothing until he had a surplus that would keep him financial if he suddenly lost his job, or the stock market suddenly went tits up; and no one could drink it away. Everything else is a bonus. Spending the money on his wife, is a pleasure.

“So, we have the room overnight right?” Mackenzie asks.  
“Yeah.”

“Are we actually going to stay in it?”

“I hadn’t planned for that, but if you want to. You can do whatever you want.”

Mackenzie considers him for a moment. He makes a wide turn at the end of the pool and starts making his way back to the shallower end. “I think it might be nice.”

“Ok,” Will agrees. He feels a pang of anxiety. What if she goes into labour? They’re not at home. The safe place. The place with the preparations. “But if you go into labour, we’re going home immediately.”

“Deal.”

Ok, well that was easy.

Mackenzie shifts her head again so that her gaze is more in line with the water. An older woman comes into the room, cellulite out in all its glory. Will feels another ‘see?’ forming on his tongue.

“Shit, it’s not that woman is it?” Mackenzie asks, letting her ass sink so that she’s more upright.

“No,” Will says quietly and takes a big step backwards to drag her back into position.

“I can see what you mean about me being snippy,” Mackenzie adds.

Will doesn’t say anything to that. He doesn’t blame her really. But that woman didn’t need to cop it. He’s supposed to be the punching bag.

“Hey, we really should have sex though,” Mackenzie says.

“Wha – when? Tonight?”

“Yeah. In that big bed. It must be a king.”

It is.

“I bet the mattress is _amazing.”_

It probably is.

“Super supportive,” Mackenzie adds.

Will watches the other woman climbing backwards down the ladder and steers clear of her, making his turn early to head back. He goes half way down the pool and moves to the side so he can lean against it, while still holding his wife afloat. She moves away from him and stands, turns to face him, and leans forward to place her hands on his thighs, leaning on them, while she kicks her feet behind her. She smiles at how uncoordinated she is. Will stretches his arms along the edge of the pool and rests.

“We haven’t had sex this year,” Mackenzie says.

Will looks for the older woman, but she’s, hopefully, not within ear shot, doing some breast stroke at the other end of the pool. “Yeah,” he turns back to his wife. “I’m aware.” ‘This year’ sounds dramatic, but it’s only been three or four weeks. Mackenzie was following his gaze, but meets his eyes again. “Is that because you’re hoping you’ll go into labour? Like that woman suggested?”

“Well, it couldn’t hurt,” Mackenzie says coyly.

“I don’t think we should.”

“Why not?” She asks sharply.

“Because,” Will hesitates. “Because he’s right there.”

“Not this again,” Mackenzie complains softly. She seems to lose her balance, because her fingers dig into his thighs.

“He’s fully formed now,” Will adds. “It really would be like poking him in the eye.”

“Jesus, he’s not _in_ my birth canal,” Mackenzie mutters.

“And then there’s the bit where it’s not sealed anymore,” Will goes on.

Mackenzie gives him a frown. “Don’t come inside me then.”

They should stop talking about this. He keeps picturing it and it’s turning him on.

“Please?” Mackenzie asks.

Ah fuck.

She reaches forward and strokes his groin and he flinches hard, dislodging her from his thighs. She goes face first into the water and he stands to grab her immediately. But she’s fine, standing herself, laughing. “See? I know you want to.”

“I _do_ want to,” Will growls, waiting for her to wipe the water from her eyes, before feeling like his protective detail duties can relax again. He crouches in the water once more. They’ve done other stuff this year, but not a lot really, and yeah, he’s been thinking about it. She’s gorgeous and has no qualms about getting naked in front of him _very_ frequently.

Mackenzie walks towards him, between his legs, but she doesn’t touch him again, just leans in for a kiss. “You know, after the baby’s born,” she kisses him again, a quick press of her mouth. “We can’t have sex for six weeks.”

“I read that bit,” Will says, his hands floating through the water to her ass. It’s such a nice ass. Fits perfectly in his hands. She means, actual intercourse, but that’s not really a guarantee for them anymore anyway. Not at his age. She talks about it like it’s a given for them, but if it doesn’t happen, it doesn’t really matter.

“This is kind of like the last chance.”

“I give,” Will squeezes her flesh and she flinches the baby into him, then winces. Oops.

“We’re going to do it tonight?”

“Ok.”

Mackenzie gives him a very devilish grin. He gets a little more turned on. “You know how to make me happy.”

Oh Christ. She didn’t mean it _that_ way, but he took it _that_ way.

“Shit, are you going to work?” Mackenzie asks, suddenly serious.

Will checks his watch (waterproof to fifty meters). “I’ve got a bit of time. Maybe ten minutes? I want to shower before I go.”

Mackenzie gives him wide eyes. “You’re not going to Habib? It’s Wednesday.”

“I’m braving it.”

“How do you feel?”

“Fine. Completely not suicidal and I don’t feel like my life is worthless anymore.”

Mackenzie studies him a moment and he’s not sure how she’ll take his flippant comment. “You felt like your life was _worthless_?”

“I –” Will hesitates. He gives a slight shrug. “You know. A while ago. What was the point in living?”

Mackenzie’s frown gets deeper.

“I mean, what was I doing with my life,” he corrects.

“When was this?”

“Years ag – before you came back.”

Mackenzie stares at him, her eyes sorrowful and he regrets changing the mood.

“We’ve got time,” Mackenzie corrects. Will stares blankly at her. “Before we get out. We’ve got time.” She means they can stay swimming for a while.

“You can stay here,” Will points out.

“I’d rather get out.”

“You want to get out now?”

“No,” Mackenzie shakes her head slightly. She gives him a smile, “I want you to swim me around again, and then we’ll get out.”

So he does.


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: this chapter is somewhat explicit.

He leaves his happy wife in the shower with the promise of return after broadcast with a proper overnight bag. She assures him that she’ll laze in bed and watch TV and order room service (and she peppers him with texts for the rest of the day too). He’s glad she’s content, and it feels a little cruel to have to go to work. It’s a nice hotel room. The room wasn’t supposed to be the highlight, but it’s a show stealer. It’s actually been a good distraction for the fact that Will isn’t going to his therapists this week. It became habitual again, but Will doesn’t feel like he’s missing a crutch. He _has_ learnt to take care of himself. But then again, they haven’t had any crises this week that could send him into a spiral once more.

Will heads into the newsroom, unbuttoning his coat, and it falls silent. He goes into his office and takes his coat off, and then realises the anomaly. He goes back to the bullpen. Everyone (most of everyone) has stopped work to stare at him. “What?” He asks. Did the world end while he was swimming?

“We thought maybe something was happening,” Tess has the unfortunate luck of being closest to him.

Christ. He’s… ok he’s a little late in to the office. But still. “Ok, guys, everybody stop!” Will calls out to the already silent bullpen. “If something happens with Mackenzie and the baby, I’ll let you know. In the meantime, assume nothing is happening,” he cuts his hands through the chair in a dismissive gesture. Jesus Christ, he’s glad Mackenzie is at home, and not here for this.

He’s not though. He’s not going to tell them anything until _after_ the baby’s born. Although, to be fair, if he can’t come into work because he’s at the hospital, he will have to let Jim know, at least. And _he’ll_ probably tell everyone else, because they will notice if Will doesn’t come into work. But if Mackenzie ends up being induced on the weekend, then no, he’s not going to be letting everyone know they’ve gone to the hospital, so they can text every half hour asking if it’s happened yet. Jesus. The birth could take hours or days (hopefully not days).

Jenna suddenly gets up from her desk and approaches him. “Morning brief,” she says tentatively.

Will takes the sheet of paper she offers him. “Thank you.” He goes back to his office. He likes Jenna. Aside from that time he kind of reamed her out at Northwestern, she’s never been afraid of him.

 

 

**********

 

Will heads home after the show goes down and throws things together into a larger duffle bag. He grabs toothbrushes and his medication, Mackenzie’s prenatal’s, the book she’s reading (about attachment theory parenting), the tablet and charger, a phone charger from his side of the bed, underwear, pyjamas, and Mackenzie’s hairbrush. Then he calls her, to see if she wants anything else in particular.

“You sound like you were asleep,” he says softly when she answers.

“No,” she tries. “Ok, yes, but only because I’m resting up for your imminent return.”

Will hears the grin in her voice and it brings a smile to his face.

“Uhm, what else do I need?” Mackenzie muses to herself. “I don’t, oh, deodorant.”

Will goes to the bathroom.

“And by the way, I googled that woman’s suggestion that we have sex to try and bring on labour.”

Will grabs both their deodorant sticks and rolls his eyes at the floor as he walks back to the bedroom. That wasn’t what the woman was suggesting.

“And it turns out that while having an orgasm is theorised to help start contractions, semen may help thin the cervix, so please, come in me all you want. Come in me _real_ hard.”

Will’s head snaps up, as if he can look out their bedroom window and see her. His groin tingles and he starts to feel warm. It takes him a moment to realise his wife has hung up on him. He loves the teasing. He loves the brazenness. And he loves the optimism. He’s not a young man anymore. He wasn’t when they met, and while it threw Mackenzie for a while, when they were first sleeping together, that he didn’t recover as quickly as a man her age would, that it took him a little longer to get turned on, and that he didn’t fuck like a raging bull anymore, she wasn’t bothered by it. Second time around, and the recovery is much, much longer, the arousal much, much slower, and his physicality much, much iffier (which may also require a lot of manual stimulation, as opposed to sheer fantasy), and she’s still not bothered. Sex for them doesn’t always mean actual intercourse, but that doesn’t mean for a second that it’s not entirely fun, satisfying, and really fucking hot. It doesn’t for a moment mean she thinks he’s less of a man because he can’t always provide her with the means for her to ride him. It’s what happens to a man his age. She signed up for this. Is it different? Sure. Does she care? No. Does she give up on him? Never.

She probably won’t be riding him tonight (not at the end of the day when he’s generally tired), but if he could, she would. If she wants his semen to efface her cervix…

It’s a weird turn on.

He’s kind of glad to be of service.

Will tucks his phone into his pocket, and grabs the duffle, heading out of the apartment and back into the New York night. The car service is waiting for him, and he gives the address for the Mandarin Oriental, heading west along Central Park towards his waiting wife. He picks the building out against the skyline and gazes up the storeys, wondering which room is theirs. He wonders what Mackenzie’s doing. He’s excited to see her. Sometimes getting out of the apartment really does wonders for them.

When Will gets upstairs and into their room, he finds it lit in soft lighting, and it’s quiet. He hesitates by the door, and then decides, if she’s asleep, he’ll let her. He makes sure the door closes softly behind him, and then he walks carefully by the bathroom to the bed and sees his wife laying on the mattress with her eyes closed. They open. “Hi,” she says brightly.

“I thought you were asleep,” Will says, as Mackenzie sits.

She shakes her head as moves to kneel. “No.” She holds up her arms and Will tosses the bag against the wall and goes to her. She gives him a happy smile and wraps her arms around his neck. The baby presses against his stomach, keeping him at a slight distance, but she draws him down to kiss him. “Good show tonight.”

“Thanks,” Will says. She kisses him again, petting the hair at the back of his head. She smells like, what he assumes, are the bath products provided by the hotel, because it’s different. He moves his hands to her waist, and then dips them to deliberately find his way to skin.

“Jesus!” Mackenzie flinches away from him. “Your hands are freezing!”

“Sorry,” Will immediately withdraws them. He bunches his fingers into fists, noticing that the skin on the back of his digits _is_ cold. He tucks the fists into the pocket of his jeans.

Mackenzie gives him a coy smile. “Yeah, you know what? You just keep your hands there for a while.” She moves up to kiss him again, her fingers in his hair and he has to admit, it’s hard to follow her instruction, to keep still; he wants to touch her. She kisses him softly but with purpose and the anticipation of being allowed to join in again starts Will up a little. If he’s only allowed his mouth for now, he concentrates on it, teasing her lips and tongue, really working on it. She gives in for air before him, slipping her mouth to the side so that his next kiss lands partially on her cheek, so he trails his mouth to her jaw, then lower to her neck, having to stoop and avoid the baby. He places feather kisses against her skin, using just the tip of his tongue to trace her pulse point. She shivers and he smiles, placing an open mouth kiss against the same spot.

Mackenzie pushes him back at the shoulder, tugging his coat off. He withdraws his hands from his pockets to allow the clothing down off his arms. It falls the floor with a thud and Mackenzie looks up at him with soft brown eyes, her cheeks red, and her lips slightly swollen. Will leans in to kiss her again, cupping his hands around her cheeks and jaw and ears. She doesn’t complain about the cold. She moves her hands to his hips, pushing his jersey up, then tugging his shirt out of his jeans. She smoothes her hands from his hip flexors up to his ribs, her fingertips soft, but firm against his skin. She rubs her thumbs over his nipples, surging heat through his body, but she’s impeded by his clothing and gives up. She rakes her fingernails down his chest on their way south again.

Will moves his hands to her shoulders and then down her back. She’s wearing a simple tee and it’s easy for him to bunch the material at her back to massage her spine a little. He has an ulterior motive compared to the other frequent back rubs, and Mackenzie knows it, and in a second she’s broken their kissing to pant in his ear lightly. Her hands still against him, fingers tucked into the top of his jeans, and he feels the way she wants to rock her hips. But when she moves closer to him, the baby presses against his lower abdomen, and that’s uncomfortable for her. It’s a good sign for Will though. He pulls back a little to pull the shirt off over her head, tousling her hair into her eyes. He lets her pick it out again, while he drops wet kisses to her breasts. Her fingers card through his hair again, fingernails raking against his skull, and petting the soft hair at the back of his head. He has to bend over to get to her nipples and he hears her cry out, as she pushes against him again, feeling off balance.

She’s easy to turn on.

And it’s so much fun.

He teases her, without following the same routine, to keep it fresh, to keep her on her toes, and to keep her distracted from him. Her arousal helps his; it’s part of the process. He works her breasts with his mouth, massages her ass with his hands, feeling the tension in her body and the enjoying the sounds in her throat. He pays attention to the cues that tell him when she’s overstimulated there, or isn’t getting enough somewhere else, and he knows when she gets to the point where she’s frustrated that she’s not getting what she wants. He makes her lay back on the bed, which would have been a smooth move on his part nine months ago, but now involves holding her hand while she gets off the bed, throwing back the covers, helping her lay down again, making sure the pillows at her back are in the right supportive places, and that he has one for his knees if he’s going to kneel on the floor. It’s about as romantic as stopping to put on a condom, but it doesn’t take long to get back to that place where she’s whimpering, and bucking her hips, and gripping the bedsheets desperately.

He likes to take his time, and she lets him. She makes requests, that he doesn’t ignore, but he likes that she lets him take charge. If she can own his ass at every other moment of his waking existence, he loves that she gives him this one thing. Of course, he’s hardwired to please her, so maybe she owns his ass at all moments of his waking existence anyway. He just loves to be able to touch her all over, and to touch her in ways that make her feel special and loved. It’s sappy, but it’s true. He’s fifty-three, not seventeen. He’s not out to get his dick wet. He wants to make love to his wife.

“Will,” Mackenzie murmurs as she comes down from the first high. He’s not quite done, but he’ll give her a breather. From his position on the floor, he can see the massive mound of the baby, but not her face. “Will,” she says again and he recognises it as a request for his presence. He gets to his feet carefully (he’s got to take better care with his knee. He’s noticed it’s been sore recently and he’s scared to take the super strength pain killers while he’s on the antidepressants).

Mackenzie reaches up her arms for him and he comes to lay next to her. His hand sliding through the curve of her waist, stroking her skin. She kisses him softly and then pushes him back to laugh. Her eyes are so dark and her cheeks red and the smile on her face so genuinely wide that Will feels his groin tingling again.

“You’re way, _way_ overdressed for this,” she breathes at him, her voice so deliciously husky. She tugs at his jersey, encouraging it up. Will sits to pull it off. “Keep going,” she instructs, so he takes his shirt off too and moves to be next to her again. Her hands stroke and smooth over his chest, teasing his nipples, making his groin throb a little harder. She knows how to get him there too, this slow and patient way of turning him on. He kisses her while she touches him, her hands finally making their way south to his jeans, tugging on his belt to disengage the buckle with one hand. She’s half on her side, and with the baby in the way, and that she’s mostly leaning on one arm, she also pops open the button of his jeans with two fingers and whips down his zipper quickly, her kisses becoming a little hotter.

Will moves his hand from her waist (he’s mostly laying on one arm too) to his hip, nudging his jeans and boxers down lower. Mackenzie’s hand slides down the front of his pelvis to get in, not waiting for him. She wraps her hand around him and he feels tension tighten inside him. He gives a groan, and encouraged, Mackenzie slides her hand down the length of him. It makes him shudder and shimmy out of his jeans and boxers a little faster. Mackenzie giggles as he sits and turns his back on her to push the last of his clothing off over his knees and feet, flicking them to the floor, while he kicks off his shoes. He turns back where she’s laying, her eyes happy and following him and he gets close again. He goes back to kissing her, while she puts her hand right back to where it was and what it was doing before.

It feels good. Of course it does, and he responds quite well to her touch. But not enough. Not enough for her cervix to be happy, which is disappointing and afterwards, when he’s cuddling with her, he has to apologise. She tells him not to be stupid. She doesn’t really care about that. She’s happily satisfied anyway. And if she has to be induced, then she has to be induced. At least she’ll know for sure that she’s in labour, and because they’ll already be at the hospital, they won’t have to make any agonising decision about when to head over there.

Will presses a kiss to his wife’s hair. “I love you, you know?”

“I do know,” she says matter-of-factly, stroking his shoulder. “You’re really good at it.”

Will chuckles lightly, caught off guard by her comment.

“It’s not a laughing matter,” Mackenzie says, shifting her hand to take his fingers, sliding hers between his. “I might miss your penis, but your fingers more than make up for it.”

Will feels like he might manage to blush.

“And your tongue,” Mackenzie adds. “Really love your tongue.”

Will smirks and shifts his gaze from their fingers to her eyes. She’s giving him a soft look of adoration that makes his heart stutter a little. “Want to take a shower before sleep?”

“Yes definitely. Will you wash my back?”

“Of course.”

“See? I knew there was a reason why I love you.”


	20. Chapter 20

_30 th January 2014_

_Thursday_

_D-Day +5_

Mackenzie wakes early, her baby clock going off. He’s trying to move in there and it pushes against her internal organs painfully, particularly her bladder, which is full and uncomfortable. It’s a shame because she’s so fantastically relaxed. Aside from the baby. She slept well and of course, having sex last night helped, and a nice warm shower before curling up in bed with her husband. She can feel his arm at her back, his fingers running along the edge of her ass and she can hear him sleeping. The baby tries shifting again and threatens her bladder control even more and she gives up on lazing in bed, feeling all boneless and happy even if she is now five days overdue.

She pushes herself to sit, moving pillows out of her way so she can get her legs over the edge of the mattress. She stands, and makes sure she’s steady before she starts walking away. She goes to the bathroom and when she comes back she sees her husband lying on his back, almost spread eagle, a bulge at his groin. She climbs back onto the king mattress, and crawls over to where he’s sleeping. His eyes are flickering, so he’s dreaming, which means he’s in a light sleep mode. She sits at his hip, having to line up so she’s facing him, and her hip is against his, because she can’t lean over with the baby in the way. She watches his face as she draws back the heavier cover slowly. The bulge becomes much more obvious with just the sheet.  She’s a little less careful about pulling that back. She’s feeling kind of eager.

Will’s shirt has ridden up slightly, exposing his navel, and the trail of dark blonde hair that goes south down his torso. Mackenzie follows it down with her eyes to his boxer shorts, where something is definitely happening. And it looks quite impressive. It looks like she could do something with it. She reaches out with her left hand and lifts the elastic waist of his boxers, tension building low in her pelvis as she frees him from the restraint of material. He rises before her and she places her hand around him. She feels a hand on her thigh almost immediately. Will’s awake, his blue eyes seem dark as he’s looking at her. She doesn’t feel caught out in the slightest, but she waits to see what he’ll say or do next, her hand gripping his penis tightly (she can feel it throbbing slightly).

“I was dreaming I was riding a horse through a field of wheat and then the next thing I know rubbing against the saddle feels really good.”

Mackenzie giggles. “That puts a whole new spin on _riding.”_

Will drops his elbows to prop himself up slightly and looks down at her hand around him and then back to her, his gaze intense and sleepy and he looks like they just finished something, instead of potentially starting. He raises his eyebrows at her and she takes that as invitation to slowly stroke her hand up the length of him, while dead staring him. He gets harder in her hand, his eyes flutter almost closed, and even when she stops, they take a moment to open and focus on her again.

“Are you?” Will asks roughly and Mackenzie doesn’t know what he’s going to ask because he doesn’t finish the sentence. He moves to sit a little higher and so Mackenzie has to move too. She’ll have to move anyway, if she’s going to straddle him.

Will can’t sit straight up against the head of the bed, otherwise when she sits in his lap, the baby will squash into her. So he reclines and she shifts to get a thigh over his. His hands at her hips grip her firmly, so she doesn’t lose her balance. Her hands press down against his stomach and he twitches gracelessly, a leg coming up behind her.

“Do you need to pee?” Mackenzie guesses. It’s almost always the way, if he’s hard in the morning. And it’s ironical, that this usually happens the morning after they’ve had sex the night before.

“Yeah,” Will says, his voice a little strained. “I’m going to have to run right out of here.”

“Ok,” Mackenzie says, even though it doesn’t need to be said. He worries that he’ll lose control and have an accident in bed. She grips him again, lining him up to slide onto him and she feels him tense again.

“Wait!” He says too slowly. She’s already sinking onto him and his protest turns into a guttural groan. She looks up to see a vein straining in his neck, his eyes fluttering closed again. She wiggles, gripping him internally to get the fit right, her body tingling with the feeling of him, her heartbeat already going up.

“What?” She asks breathlessly.

Will opens his eyes, his expression desperate. “Are you ok?”

“Yes,” she says sweetly. She feels the way his hands pull forward at her, subconscious while he’s trying to ask her if she was ready, but of course, “I wouldn’t climb on board if I wasn’t ready.” She moves back and shifts her hands to his arms for balance, rocking forward slowly again. She’s kind of desperate to get this going while the opportunity has arisen, pun intended. She doesn’t care that he’s older. She doesn’t care that sex means something different now from ten years ago, when they were first sleeping together. She doesn’t care that he really didn’t like taking the Viagra (it wasn’t that great anyway), which he did when they got back together, because he thought that’s what she wanted, and wanted to stop (though, it helped them conceive their son. Certain mechanics have to be adhered to). And she doesn’t care that not taking it now means they have to take their chances while they can get them.

He lets her control it, his hands at her hips to help with balance, and she needs it a bit. She wants to ride him fucking hard, to blow his mind and hers, but it’s just not realistic. She’s very pregnant and so even though she would class this as a quickie, it’s not really quick at all. It’s slow and deliberate in their movements, though the fact that his bladder is full, which is helping create his magnificent erection, is still on his mind, and she can tell, has her wanting to hurry up. He’s just _slightly_ distracted.

He warns her when he’s close and she asks him to touch her to help her along. There’s a slight hesitation when they’re both so close and they’re almost waiting for the other to go first. As soon as he does, he needs the bathroom and she half loathes ending it without a massive, mind-blowing, explosion of passion, that she can draw out as long as possible, but they can’t do that either. He doesn’t orgasm as hard as he used to. And she knows he’s afraid to let go entirely right now too. It would take much more to recover from the humiliation of wetting the bed in his fifties ( _I’ll save that for my nineties, if that’s ok with you)._ So she tips her pelvis against his fingers and feels herself starting to go, knowing he’ll be a second behind her anyway. So even though they go together, it feels more separate and before she even really starts to come down, he moves her to the side gently and is gone.

Mackenzie wiggles her way to the head of the bed so she can use a pillow and a moment later Will is back. He climbs onto the mattress behind her, spooning in close and she smiles as his arm slings over her waist. He presses a kiss to the edge of her shoulder. “That was pretty amazing,” he says in a low tone and she smiles some more. “And you got what you wanted.”

“I always get what I want,” Mackenzie says smugly.

 

 

**********

 

They cuddle only for a little while, seeing as they actually have to get organised to check out of their room. They order room service and take a quick shower. Now that they’re back to one nozzle, sharing is less fun for Will, and Mackenzie acknowledges how awesome having a double shower really is. She gets out quickly, leaving her husband to shave in some actual water. She dries off and dresses in the clothes she wore yesterday. She picks his up and notices he changed last night. Which seems odd, for a second, but he must not plan to go home today, and probably wouldn’t want to go to the office in the clothes they saw him in yesterday. She’s laughing to herself about how much he cares what other people think of him, when room service knocks on the door.

Mackenzie pulls the bathroom door closed on her showering, naked husband, and lets the room attendant in. She takes Will’s wallet out of his jeans and gives the guy a tip. He leaves silently and Mackenzie takes the tops off the plates, until she finds the eggs she ordered. She sits at the desk to eat. It’s too hard to try and balance a plate on her lap when she hasn’t seen her lap for the last two months. Not with the giant Nebraskan, Mountain Man baby she has inside her.

Will emerges from the bathroom, a white towel wrapped around his hips. She eyes him up as he walks towards her, fucking sexy man. He comes to stand by her and reaches for his coffee. “How’s the food?”

“Good,” Mackenzie replies, reaching a stray hand to his waist. He grips her fingers and gives them a squeeze, then moves off to dress. “So, what are we going to do this morning before you have to go to work?”

“Whatever you want,” Will says, his voice muffled in his shirt. He’s got boxers on and Mackenzie admires his abdomen until he covers up. He slips jeans on next. Shame. “We could swim, or walk in the park for a bit?” He looks over at her. “Not the whole way.”

Mackenzie smirks slightly. Yeah, she might suggest they do that. Walk home. It’s not far. She goes back to her eggs and Will finishes dressing. He lifts the duffle to the bed and throws in his razor and digs out his antidepressants. He takes two with his coffee and then tosses the bottle back into the bag. So casual. But he’s medicating to improve his mood and that’s a big thing. Is he happy now because he’s happy, or is he happy because he’s medicated? Mackenzie dislodges the thoughts by getting up from the desk. She’s finished her breakfast and she goes about putting her things in the bag, while Will takes her place to eat. She picks up their swimsuits from in front of the windows where they were attempting to dry. They’re still a little damp, so Mackenzie decides a walk in the park would be nice. It’s overcast, but it’s not snowing or raining.

Will’s happy because _he’s_ happy. She knows that. She doesn’t need to question it (she shouldn’t really pick at it).

Mackenzie goes to get their toothbrushes, finishing the packing and Will finishes eating and they’re ready to go. Mackenzie steps into her slip on’s and Will tugs on his shoes, leaning over the bed to tie the laces. They put on coats and head down to the lobby. Will checks them out and then turns to her and offers his left hand. She smiles and takes it, walking close to him so that she can lean on his arm. They stop just outside the hotel door to button their coats up, and cross the road into the park, following one of the concrete pathways that will take them east (and slightly north, but it loops back), so that when they emerge they’ll be somewhere close to their apartment.

At their apartment building, they say goodbye on the street, while Will raises his hand for a cab. Will gives Mackenzie a kiss and reluctantly hands over the duffle. It’s not heavy, but he’s hesitant to let her carry it, even upstairs. He has to get to work.

“I had a really good time,” Mackenzie says to him and his soft eyes make him look happy and proud.

“I’m glad,” he responds softly. A cab pulls up next to them.

“We could meet for lunch?” Mackenzie says hopefully, reaching to open the car’s door for him.

“I think you should stay home,” Will says firmly.

Mackenzie narrows her eyes at him. “Because?”

“In case,” he gestures to her stomach.

“In case I go into labour in the deli so fast that I give birth right there on the shop floor?” Mackenzie retorts.

Will tilts his head slightly, his mouth narrowing. “I think we should go back to putting you in a hospital bed with an epidural.”

Mackenzie affords him a slight laugh, and swats at his chest. “Fine, I’ll see you after the show.”

Will hops into the waiting cab and shuts his door, watching his wife enter their building, unbuttoning her coat with one hand until she’s out of his eye sight. The cabbie pulls into traffic, heading west before turning south and heading further down the island to the AWM building.

“Hey buddy, can I give you some advice?” The driver speaks up.

“No,” Will answers.

“Never tell a pregnant lady what she can’t do,” he says anyway.

“Yeah,” Will says, looking out the window. “I already know.”


	21. Chapter 21

_31 st January 2014_

_Friday_

_D-Day+6_

Mackenzie steps off the elevator, unwrapping a scarf from her neck that she didn’t really need. It was overcast today, but there hasn’t been snow for a while now, and even though it’s cold, walking around, and the baby, keep her plenty warm. She heads into the newsroom bullpen, where most of the staff are at their desks, working on tomorrow’s stories. Will’s about to broadcast, so they’re subdued, aware that they’ll be in view of the cameras from over his shoulder. As she goes in, Mackenzie can see her husband at the desk, a finger to his ear, adjusting his earpiece. She’s spotted almost instantly but Tamara, who gives her a bright greeting.

“Is it happening?” She asks next.

“No,” Mackenzie winces, as she walks by the other woman’s desk. “I just wanted to stop by and say hello.”

Because tomorrow, if nothing has happened, she’ll be giving birth by induction. She’s ok with it. Mostly because she’s fed up with being pregnant. More than fed up with it.

Tamara gives her a sympathetic expression and Mackenzie gives her a wan smile. She approaches the door to the control room corridor at the same time as Kelli. The senior producer gives her a warm smile. But she doesn’t ask her if she’s in labour. She holds the door for Mackenzie and follows her into the control room. Jim’s talking to Will about a detail with a story, and they debate back and forth for a second. Kelli goes to Jim and gives him a paper, and Mackenzie hangs back to slip out of her coat. There are chairs along the back of the control room wall that are too high for her to get onto. She dumps her coat there instead. Jim suddenly looks back at her and she approaches.

“Aren’t you supposed to be taking it easy?” He asks softly. Kelli departs again.

“Why?” Mackenzie challenges. “Can I?” She indicates the monitors, meaning she wants to talk to Will. Jim reaches for a spare headset and hands it over. After she dons the equipment and looks up, she notices Will’s taking a drink from his cup of water. “Oh Will,” she calls and he promptly drops it, right into his lap.

“Jesus!” He exclaims.

Mackenzie laughs. “Every time!”

“I look like I wet my pants,” Will complains.

“You did wet your pants,” Mackenzie points out.

Will stares down the camera. “What are you doing here? Is something happening?”

“No,” she says tightly. Oh good. Now _he’s_ asking. Although, to be fair, if anyone is allowed to ask, it’s him. “I got bored at home.”

“You got bored?” Will asks, slightly incredulous, as Herb calls sixty seconds. “Honey, you should get back in bed.”

Mackenzie thinks: wow. Patronising a-hole.

And then she thinks: he probably didn’t mean it to sound that way.

She could start a domestic right here, in front of half of their subordinates (with the rest of them not far away), or she could rise above it.

“I’ve been in bed all day,” she says lightly. “I’m going to spend an hour doing something else. Then I’ll go back to bed.”

Will doesn’t get to retort because Herb calls down the start of the show and the opening credits roll. Mackenzie gives her headset back so she doesn’t blurt something else out to put her husband off broadcasting, and then sits in Jim’s chair, out of the way, and watches the show from her favourite place in all the world to watch the show: the control room.

Will looks good in those suits and she likes the lilt of his voice. At the end of the A block he fusses with his pants and she smiles to herself a little, wondering if he’s terribly uncomfortable sitting in his wet pants. He could take them off and their audience would be none the wiser. She’s always found it interesting he puts the full suit on, including the polished shoes, when no one really sees.  

At the end of the B block, Will asks Jim if Mackenzie is still there. “Yes,” Jim says, and looks around at her. She shares a steady look with her EP, wondering what her husband wants. Will unplugs his mic pack and gets up from the desk, so Mackenzie gets up from her chair and goes to meet him in the corridor. He has to be quick. He doesn’t have a lot of commercial for conversation.

“What are you doing?” Mackenzie starts to tell him off.

“I’m sorry, ok? For –” He waves a hand in the air, his expression earnest. “There’s no implication you need to be taken care of. I just worry about you.”

“I know, and I’m fine,” Mackenzie says firmly. “I missed you, and I’ve spent the last two days at home in bed or on the couch. I need to leave the apartment occasionally.”

“I completely understand,” Will says quickly. He pauses for a second. “Thirty back.”

“You should go,” Mackenzie says.

“You’re going to wait around?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok,” he plants a quick kiss on her head.

Mackenzie frowns at his back as he hurries back to the studio. She hates it when he does that. If he’s going to kiss her, kiss her properly. She’d call him back, but he doesn’t have time. She goes back to the control room and sees her husband already at his desk, mic pack back on, adjusting his shoulders so that they’re squared with the camera and not hunched. Jim glances at her as she goes back in, but she just gives him a ‘yes?’ expression, and takes her seat again in the back of the room. With everyone’s attention on the monitors again as the C block starts, she smiles to herself. Her husband knows when to apologise without her having to tell him he’s done anything wrong.

 

 

**********

 

As the show goes down, Mackenzie tells everyone it was a good show tonight, and then gathers her things up to go and wait in Will’s office. She says hello to a few other people she didn’t see before, and ends up talking about Colorado’s weed sales with Tess and Neal. Neither of them dare ask if she’s in labour; they were probably already warned off by Tamara. Will comes from the studio and she gives him a smile, but he looks worried. She wonders what’s going on and then his hand is on her elbow and he’s saying that they should head home.

What is with him tonight?

“Go and get changed,” she instructs and he seems to realise he’s still in his broadcast suit. She turns back to her conversation. Don finds her and comes to say hello. And before Will can get back, though she’s sure he hurried, Elliott comes down from his office to talk to her too. He’s counting off how many days each of his kids were overdue, but Mackenzie is still out championing his wife, who’s longest stretch was five days, with her first. Mackenzie’s not sure if that’s supposed to make her feel better, or horrify her, but either way, she’s glad when Will comes back and she can say goodnight.

Has all her conversational prowess boiled down to the baby and when she’s going to give birth? Is that all she’s worth now?

Will takes her elbow again as they head through the bullpen. He doesn’t march her, but he definitely guides her, and she doesn’t like it. When they get to the elevators, she steps away from him to release his grip, and turns towards him. “Good show tonight,” she tries.

“Yeah,” he says, jabbing the call button on the elevator again.

Mackenzie narrows her eyes at him a little but he doesn’t notice.

Ok.

She goes quiet because she doesn’t want to poke him with a stick. For two reasons. The first being, they’re still at work, and if they’re going to have a fight, she’d rather do it in private. Especially now that they’re married, and she’s his boss. The second reason is that she can respect the need for silence.

So they go home with little words and Mackenzie notices Will taps his foot on the floor of the vehicle. So, he’s agitated about something, and she’ll wait until they get home until she asks. Peter, their doorman, or one of their doormen, says hello as they go through the lobby and Mackenzie returns the sentiment while Will barely acknowledges it. Mackenzie suppresses a sigh in the elevator up to their floor. She wants to be zen, if something’s bugging her husband, (lord knows Will manages it just fine when she’s being bitchy), but it’s difficult. She wishes he would just talk to her, if he’s bothered about something, but then she also tells herself that she can’t compare him against the old standards forever, when he really does make an effort to talk to her these days. She shouldn’t assume. Maybe he’s waiting for the privacy of their apartment as well.

Will unlocks the door and pushes it open for her to go in first. She’s already taking off her coat and as she reaches to hook it, Will takes it from her to do it. She unwinds the scarf and he waits to take that for her too. She goes through to the kitchen to get a glass of water, and Will follows her a moment later, sans his coat.

“How was your day?” She asks him, standing with a glass at the sink. She reaches for the tap to fill it.

“How come you came down to the newsroom tonight?”

“My day was good too, thank you,” Mackenzie says pointedly, drinking her water. Will gives an unimpressed expression as his eyes drift from her to the side of the kitchen bench. When he looks at her again, he’s neutral. Mackenzie finishes her water. “Want some?”

“No thanks,” Will says softly.

“I was bored,” Mackenzie answers him, putting her glass in the sink.

“You should rest.”

“I’ve rested for two days,” she reminds him, coming around the bench. “Haven’t left the building. I’m going a little stir crazy.”

Will looks down at her as she slides her arms around his waist. The baby doesn’t let her get close at all but she’ll still try to hug her husband as much as she can. He puts his hands on her shoulders. “Stir crazy,” he echoes and gives a slight sigh. “Shall we get ready for bed?”

“Always trying to get me into bed,” Mackenzie teases and steps away from him to do just that. She heads down to their bedroom, hearing him turn lights out behind her, before following. The bed is messy. She didn’t make it and spent most of the day propped up with pillows reading and researching. It’s like camping out with a cold, except she’s not ill. She’s pregnant. She goes to brush her teeth. Except, she gets about as far as putting the paste on the brush before she hears, “What the fuck is this?” from the bedroom, and goes back in, alarmed.


	22. Chapter 22

Will’s got some of the papers she had on the bed in his hand, looking at them, and then over at her, with a glare. “You’re house hunting?” He accuses. The papers are of Manhattan real estate.

Mackenzie’s face morphs from surprise to anger to a glare herself. “No,” she shoots back and goes to stand near him, toothbrush still in hand. “I was just taking a look, to see what was out there.”

“At houses.”

“You said you wanted to move!” She defends herself.

“I didn’t think you’d do this without me.”

“I haven’t bought a house Will, I was just looking to see what was around. I’m _bored!”_ She stops suddenly, aware that she’s raising her voice, that her heart rate is up, and that this sounds like a conversation from about four months ago, where they pick and defend, attack and yell. “What’s with you tonight?” She asks gently, reversing her tone and facial expression and body language, trying to calm down, and show him that she’s not a threat, so he might calm down as well.

Will blinks at her a moment and then turns away and paces a few feet in silence, before turning back, his hand to his eyes, rubbing them, like he’s tired. “I’m sorry,” he sighs and looks at her. “The waiting’s getting to me.”

Oh, he means the baby.

“Me too,” Mackenzie says.

“Yeah, I know, more so for you.”

“You’ve been so patient –”

“I didn’t mean to snap.”

“It’s ok to get frustrated,” Mackenzie finishes, though what bugged her the most was the accusation. They watch each other for a moment. And also the implication that she needs someone else to take care of her – tell her when she is and is not allowed out of the apartment. “I’m sorry he’s not – I’m not in labour.”

“That’s not your fault,” Will says.

“It kind of is. My body is supposed to know when he’s ready.”

“He’s just not ready yet,” Will tries.

“Well, tomorrow he won’t have a choice.”

“We could have sex again,” Will says, coming closer, so he has to stoop to look her in the eye.

Mackenzie gives him a slight smile. “That sounds like _fun_ , but no. We tried. Nothing happened. I’m just going to call Katherine tomorrow and we’ll do it her way.”

Will stands for a moment, where he is, looking at her, and she thinks for a moment he might try to argue against it, but then he nods, “If that’s what you want.”

“It is,” Mackenzie confirms, and she suspects that is what he wants too. Will watches her again and then nods. “Is that ok with you?” She thinks to ask.

“Whatever you want honey,” he says, switching back to his gentle tone, his caring demeanour.

“I want,” Mackenzie says, and brushes past him to go clean her teeth. She thinks. She’d rather it happen naturally, but she’s also aware of how over waiting she is too. And Will, it seems, has finally reached his limit of patience. He follows her in a moment later and does his teeth too, and they share looks in the mirror, making each other smile sillily. When Mackenzie goes back to the bedroom she sees he’s tidied up all the papers and stacked them on her nightstand. He’s put her tablet on top and he’s straightened out the bedcovers. A part of her is annoyed, for a second, that he’s done that, reorganised her things or more that there’s an implication that she’s been messy, but another part tells her that she doesn’t care. In the grand scheme of things, who gives a fuck about this? She gets into bed.

She’s tired and a little achy. Maybe she shouldn’t have gone down to the newsroom, but maybe she hasn’t left the house since they went swimming and she needed the change in scenery; she needs human contact. She hears her husband finishing in the bathroom and the flick of light switches as he swaps over-head lights for the plug in light, and the almost silent swing of the bathroom door. With her eyes closed she can’t detect the change in illumination. She listens to her husband’s feet on the carpet, and the swish of clothing against his skin as he changes and then she can sense him closer and the pull of the bedcovers as he gets into bed. Their mattress is a no roll-between but she can still tell when he lays down next to her. Or, over there.

“Hey,” she says.

“Hm?”

“Come here,” she requests, eyes still closed. When he doesn’t kiss her, she opens her eyes to see him leaning on an elbow, near enough. She reaches up with her arm to draw him gently by the ear closer. She presses her lips against his. “Goodnight.”

“Night,” he says and she lets him go. She closes her eyes again and she feels him lay down, right where he is, closer to the middle of the bed. She reaches out a hand and finds his arm easily, laying her fingers over the top of his forearm, near his elbow. His skin is warm.

“Sorry.”

“For?” Mackenzie asks curiously.

“The house – accusing you.”

Mackenzie flickers her eyes open, but he’s staring at the wall opposite their bed. And just when she thinks he doesn’t get it, he does. “Thank you, but not a big deal. Nothing to worry about. I haven’t been particularly pleasant this week myself.”

“You’re fine,” Will says, turning his head towards her.

Because she doesn’t want to start an argument over who has been more of an ass this week (and she’s pretty sure it was her, but won’t be able to get him to agree – and is not sure that she wants him to), she doesn’t say anything. There’s an achy, foreboding, tense feeling in her gut that she doesn’t like, and she hopes it’s not a premonition. She hopes she can sleep it off. She closes her eyes once more. Will doesn’t speak to her again, but sometime later, not too long after they finish talking, she feels him get out of bed again. She falls promptly to sleep.

 

 

**********

 

_1 st February 2014_

_Saturday_

_D-Day +7_

 

Mackenzie wakes in the wee hours of the morning, needing to pee. The baby is very still inside her and the achy feeling in her abdomen has gotten worse. She gets out of bed carefully, aware that her husband is there with her now, asleep himself. As she’s sitting on the edge of the mattress, about to stand, she feels a looseness in her bowels. She breaks out in a sweat and goes quickly to the bathroom. Is she ill? Did she eat something iffy? She can’t remember what she had for dinner last night, or actually, what did she have for dinner the night before? She can’t remember. Was it takeout? She’s been so careful with food, and any leftovers Will’s left in the fridge for her. Sometimes she doesn’t eat them, which annoys him, but she should be careful.

Mackenzie sits for a while but that was it. The achy feeling in her abdomen is still there, but her bowel feels fine now and so she risks going back to bed. But she lays awake for a while, paying attention to every shift of the baby, every twinge of her stomach and the way she’s breathing. She debates waking her husband. She knows he’ll worry, probably insist they go to the emergency room or something, but she’s not sure her symptoms warrant that. Then again, she’s pregnant, so maybe any symptoms warrant a trip to the emergency room at two in the morning? If she’s sick, can she transfer any kind of bacteria to the baby? She can’t remember what goes through the placenta anymore. Some illnesses must; German measles. Actually, she’s not sure why everyone’s paranoid about German measles and pregnancy. Was it because it affects her, or the baby?

And should she wake her husband right now?

Is the aching getting worse?

Maybe she should wake him so he can calm her down. Except he won’t, if his mood last night was anything to go by, he’ll flip out and want to go to the hospital.

Mackenzie reaches for her tablet on the nightstand. She blinds herself with unlocking the screen, and then turns the brightness right down to its lowest setting, which is still too much illumination that cuts into her retinas. She pries one eye open and brings up the web browser, and then awkwardly types in ‘German measles and pregnancy’. That’s not really what she wants to know, but she’s curious now.

_Rubella_ _is most dangerous to your baby if you catch it during the first 20 weeks of pregnancy. It can cause miscarriage, stillbirth or birth defects in unborn babies, such as: hearing loss, brain damage…_

Ok, so she doesn’t have German measles, but that wasn’t the point anyway. She types in ‘food poisoning and pregnancy’ and starts trawling pages. It’s all harrowing stuff, about premature births and spontaneous miscarriages, and stillbirths, but that’s not helpful for her, because they talk about listeria and toxoplasmosis gondii, of which the symptoms are muscle stiffness, flu-like symptoms, or no symptoms at all. She tries different search terms, ‘41 weeks and food poisoning’, ‘full term and food poisoning’, then gives up on food poisoning and tries ‘full term and illness’, but that’s not helpful either (it comes up with nonthyroidial illnesses in full term babies, probiotic treatment for babies, and a whole bunch of stuff for premature babies).

Behind her, Will turns over, and she flattens the tablet screen against her breast to cut the light, in case he notices and asks her what she’s doing. Before she alarms him, she’d like to have a clue what’s going on, and she’d rather he get a good night’s sleep, because if they’re going to the hospital tomorrow, she wants one of them to be able to remain alert and level-headed enough to understand what’s happening. If he’s had little sleep, he can’t help her, and she needs him to help her.

She waits a moment before bringing the tablet up again. She has to log in once more and goes back to her searching. Finally, she just taps in ‘diarrhoea’, ‘cramps’ and ‘pregnancy’ into the search box and lets Google have at it. It comes back with a few pages, the first talks about early pregnancy symptoms, so she goes back and tries the next page, which explains how and why diarrhoea is common in pregnancy, because of diet and hormone changes, but Mackenzie skips through most of that one too, because she hasn’t really been bothered by her bowels until now. Considering how common it is, she might now consider herself lucky. But then something right at the bottom of the page catches her eye and she slows down to read it.

Something clicks in her mind, something she read in the pregnancy books about early labour symptoms. Diarrhoea can be an indication that her body is preparing to give birth.

That’s it.

She’s not sick at all.

She’s in labour.


	23. Chapter 23

She thinks.

She’s definitely having signs of early labour: the diarrhoea and the cramping. But that doesn’t mean anything will happen today or even tomorrow (or, good god, one woman in the comments said she waited another five days!). At least she knows she’s not in immediate danger of… She’s not sick. There is, at least, that. She needs to sleep now though and stop thinking about it. If she is in early labour, she has a _long_ way to go. She shuts the tablet off and closes her eyes again. She can see the image of the last web page she was looking at imprinted on her eyes. When she blinks it floats through her mind’s eye until it fades and she blinks again. She focuses on her breathing, keeping it even and slowed; she feels the movements of the baby within her, telling him silently that she’ll meet him soon. It works. And she falls asleep.

When she wakes again it’s because she needs the bathroom. The sun is up, but it’s not bright. “Hey,” Will says softly from behind her when she sits.

“Hey,” she says back, and moves off to the other room. When she comes back she finds her husband sitting up in bed, reading her parenting book, curtains open and coffee in one hand. “What time is it?” She asks him.

“Nearly ten,” he responds without having to look. His hair is still ruffled from sleep.

Mackenzie makes a noise in her throat and sits on the bed.

“You ok?” Will asks.

“Actually,” she looks over at him. “I think I’m in early labour.”

Will watches her a moment, his eyebrows going up slightly. “You sure?”

“No,” Mackenzie admits. “I feel quite crampy and… My guts aren’t happy.”

Will watches her a moment. “No contractions?”

“No,” she shakes her head.

Will nods slowly. “Anything I can do for you?”

Mackenzie shakes her head again.

“Did you sleep ok?” Will asks gently.

Mackenzie sighs. “I got up in the night for the loo and then wasn’t sure what was happening so I Googled.” She moves to get under the covers again, a laborious procedure. Will holds his coffee out of the way, lays the book against his thigh, and helps lift the cover out of her way while she settles on her side facing him, the body pillow tucked between her thighs and curving under the baby.

“I didn’t notice,” Will notes.

“I didn’t want to wake you,” Mackenzie explains. “I figure, if this is it…”

Will drops the cover in place and she adjusts it under her arm. She looks over at him. He doesn’t argue with her on the sleep. And he doesn’t insist that she wake him. There really is not much he can do for her, except maybe offer some company.

“It was fine,” Mackenzie adds.

“You want some breakfast?”

“Mm,” Mackenzie hedges.

“Have to eat,” Will says gently.

“I know. I’m not ready.”

“Ok,” Will backs down. “You let me know.”

 

 

**********

 

Mackenzie dozes for another hour and is woken by the chime of a phone. At first, she thinks its hers, and dreads the message, probably from her mother, asking if she’s had the baby yet. She’s sure her family assumes it’s a girl, considering how far overdue she is, but fool on them, she thinks smugly. Mackenzie opens her eyes and sees Will peering at his phone. He’s squinting at it. “Something wrong?” She asks.

He looks over at her. “No. It’s Gideon.”

“Oh? How are things with Gideon?”

“He says good, but nuts.”

Mackenzie gives a slight smile and moves to sit up. Beside her, Will types a response and then puts his phone down. He’s still in his pyjamas and he’s still reading. She hasn’t noticed the squinting before. “Have you eaten?” She asks.

“No, I was waiting for you.”

“You must be starving!”

Will gives her a shrug. “Coffee kept me going.”

“Let’s have breakfast.”

“Ok, tea and toast? Or something different? Eggs?”

“Eggs sounds good actually.”

“Eggs it is,” Will says and throws back the covers. She watches as he hobbles for a moment around the bed and wonders when he got so old. Gideon is half his age, and yet their children are practically the same age. It’s so strange that they’re doing this now. They could have done it five years ago. They could have had several kids in that time. Or they might have driven each other nuts and divorced.

Mackenzie feels a tightening of her uterus. It starts at the bottom, near her pelvis, and moves up quickly towards her ribs. It feels intense, in that it feels like it’s serious business, but she wouldn’t have said it hurt. It got her attention, but it wasn’t all consuming. For a second, it feels like it lingers, but then it’s gone, and the baby shifts a shoulder. She realises she was holding her breath, and lets it go. She hears the tink of a metal pan striking the stove top and debates about getting up to tell Will. He’ll be back in a minute.

He’s more than a minute. He’s more like twenty minutes. But he comes in with a tray in one hand, and a plate in the other and comes over to the bed. The tray is for her, a plate of scrambled eggs, toast on the side, and a cup of the apple tea she likes. His plate didn’t fit on the tray, but he’s having the same, and there’s another coffee there too. Mackenzie thanks him straight away and waits until he’s back in bed beside her, legs crossed, facing her slightly. He settles his plate on a thigh and picks up his knife and fork, preparing to eat.

“I had a contraction,” Mackenzie announces.

Will’s head snaps up to look at her, his blue eyes slightly wider than usual.

“Just one. It felt legitimate.”

Will blinks.

“It didn’t hurt,” she adds.

“Do you think this is it?” He asks, hopeful, but no pressure.

“I think it is,” Mackenzie says lightly.

 

 

**********

 

They eat, and lay around in bed, waiting for another contraction but after an hour, there’s nothing and Mackenzie can feel herself getting frustrated and restless. She’s trying to read the parenting book, but she can’t quite concentrate. Every time the baby moves she thinks it’s her uterus tightening. It’s going to be a long day.

“Hm?” Will looks over at her.

“Did I say that out loud?”

“Yeah?” He gives her slightly bewildered eyes.

“I’m just complaining that it’s going to be a long day.”

“Waiting for something to happen?” He asks, or finishes her thought.

“Yeah,” she says with a sigh.

“Ok,” Will pulls himself to sit with his abdominal muscles, tossing the tablet to the middle of the bed where neither of their legs are stretched over the mattress. “Let’s get up. Let’s go for a walk.”

Mackenzie frowns at his back as he gets out of bed. He walks over to the walk in robe and disappears. He comes back with his jeans and a shirt, and tosses them to the end of the bed. “No, babe,” Mackenzie starts to protest as he goes back into the closet. He reappears, socks in hand, and tosses them to the bed. They land with a plop on top of his jeans.

“No to which part?”

“The walk, I can’t –”

“Yes,” he urges softly. He comes back into the bedroom and comes around the bed, to lean down near where she’s laying on her side. “Come on. It’ll be good to get out of the apartment.”

Mackenzie gives him a bleak expression. “I’m too tired.”

“Yeah, we’ll go slow. Just the loop, as slowly as you want,” he reaches for her hand and starts to pull her to sit. “It could help with labour.”

Mackenzie doesn’t fight him too hard. “Is it snowing?”

“No,” he says immediately.

“You didn’t even look,” Mackenzie shifts her legs to put her feet on the floor.

“It’s not snowing, it’s not going to snow today, and it’s not going to rain.”

Mackenzie stares at him. “Did you check?”

Will gives a shrug and goes back to the wardrobe. That was a yes. He comes back with a pair of her yoga pants and a tee shirt. If it’s not too cold outside, she won’t need many layers. He’ll make her wear a coat, to protect from the wind, if there is any, but she’ll get warm quickly. He knows her. He knows pregnant her. He knows that she’s restless and a walk will help ease that nervous energy. He knows that exercise is good for her, particularly in the third trimester, and he knows that when they get to the hospital, at some point in the next few days (fingers crossed) she won’t be walking anywhere.

Will shrugs out of his pyjamas and puts on his jeans and the tee he was wearing yesterday. Then he pulls his wife to stand and manhandles her (gently) into her clothes. He stoops to put socks on her feet, and then helps her into trainers, and ties the laces for her as well. He puts on a jersey, and pulls trainers onto his own feet, before he follows her down to the front door, where he helps her into a coat and insists she take a scarf. He pulls on a jacket himself, and takes a scarf and woollen hat.

“Are you ready?” Mackenzie asks amused.

“Keys,” Will grabs his set from the hook by the door and tucks them into his pocket. He turns back to her, “Ready.”

But Mackenzie stops him with a hand on his arm, staring at a spot on the floor for a moment.

“What?” Will asks, softly, but his tone also tight with tension.

Mackenzie looks up at him, feeling hot. “I just had another contraction.”


	24. Chapter 24

Mackenzie gets out of the shower and starts drying off and has another contraction. That makes three in just over three hours. They’re not on the dot and they’re not regular, and she keeps thinking ‘this could be it’, even though she knows that she could get contractions every twenty minutes for several hours and then it could all just stop. The key is (apparently) to stay relaxed and stay at home. Where she can be relaxed. So she finishes drying herself carefully and then walks to the bedroom where her clean clothes are laid out on the bed (she picked them this time). Will’s straightened out the covers but he’s already dressed and moved on to make lunch. Their walk wasn’t vigorous, and she hasn’t worked up an appetite, but she can appreciate it’s something to do. Maybe it’s something for Will to do.

She was wrong to think all the waiting wasn’t getting to him too.

Of course it would.

He’s in the kitchen, making grilled cheese, and for a moment, she stands in the doorway watching him. He’s concentrating on cutting cheese, and has the rest of the ingredients out, lined up on the bench. He’s methodical, always has been, as far as she can tell. He’s organised so he can be prepared for the unexpected. He learnt that from his childhood, but it was reinforced in law school. She’s not particularly scattered, but he does take good care of her, filling in all the gaps she overlooks. And now that they survived marriage counselling, they’re becoming more and more each other’s perfect fit.

Mackenzie steps into the room and Will looks over and he’s immediately attentive. She gives him a small smile, knowing that whatever happens with the birth, if she still has to be induced, it will be ok, because Will won’t let her down. And she knows that when the baby does arrive, Will’s going to be a really good father.

“Everything ok?” Will asks when she comes to stand next to him silently. He stops what he’s doing. She can feel the warmth of his skin through the t-shirt he’s wearing. She puts her arm around his waist. He smells clean and it’s comforting.

“Yeah,” Mackenzie answers him and moves away so he’ll go back to making their food. She puts water on to boil to make tea and asks if he wants a coffee.

“Sure.”

Mackenzie hears the hiss of something cold hitting the hot pan, which she figures is buttered bread. She nudges the baby into the bench as she reaches for mugs from the cupboard.

“Can I talk to you about something?” Will asks at her back.

Mackenzie puts the mugs on the bench and half turns to look at him. He’s not paying her much attention though, placing the lids on their grilled cheese. She reaches for the tea bags. “Of course,” she answers him.

There’s a pause and then: “What’s happening with the induction, if you’re actually in labour?”

Mackenzie presses the apple tea bag to her nose, breathing in the scent, tasting it on her tongue. When she turns this time, because the water is going nuts and the pan is loud, Will is looking at her over his shoulder, spatula raised in one hand, his eyebrows up and expectant.

“That’s a very good question,” Mackenzie says. “I don’t know. I don’t know that I’m in labour and I don’t know if I’m supposed to call Katherine, or if she’s going to call me.”

Will gives a nod and turns his attention back to his pan, but Mackenzie knows that that’s not the end of the conversation. The water clicks off behind her, so she pours it, making her husband an instant coffee with milk. He works on their lunch and she dawdles to time the beverages with his food, and so she can think. They go through to sit on the sofa while they eat, Will tapping his thigh to gesture she place her feet in his lap. He eats with his left hand while he rubs her foot with the other.

Mackenzie finishes her sandwich and leans over to put her empty plate on the coffee table. She takes up her tea instead, resting it against her chest while her husband attempts his one handed foot massage. Despite being on the alert for any kind of twinge from her uterus, there are no more contractions. She sighs and that catches Will’s attention. He leans forward to ditch his plate on the table too, his eyes on her.

“I think I’d rather wait until Katherine calls me,” Mackenzie says into the silence. Will gives her an attentive expression. “I’d rather not have to be induced.”

Will sips his coffee. He doesn’t call her out on her contradiction of the day before, when she said she was ok with being induced. If she can go into labour on her own, which might be happening right now, then she’d rather that, and he must know that, even if she changes her mind.

“That sounds like a good plan,” is what Will says.

 

 

**********

 

It’s a good plan, but it’s a long day. They sit and lay on the couch after lunch and Will attempts to watch more Superbowl build-up. He’s gotten out of touch with this season, which he puts down to the crap year he’s had and that he lost interest in a lot of things he used to be interested in (and in which he is now trying to make an effort to give a crap about again). He missed the World Series completely. Hasn’t been to play a round of golf in over a year. But Mackenzie isn’t entertained by the football and he gives in to her restlessness to ask if she wants to pick something to watch. She takes the remote and surfs through the channels all the way back around to the start and declares there’s nothing to watch.

Will asks her if she wants to put a movie on. She declines.

He asks her if she wants to get out of the apartment to see a movie. She declines.

He suggests a nap. She claims she’s not tired.

Ok, he was saving this for later, but… “Come with me,” he says, nudging her feet to the floor and standing.

“Where are we going?” Mackenzie asks warily.

Will reaches out his hand and helps tug her to her feet. “I have something for us to do.”

“What is it?” Mackenzie asks.

Will moves slowly across the room, trailing his wife behind him. “Putting the baby’s clothes away.” He feels Mackenzie tug on his fingers but he doesn’t stop walking towards the nursery.

“I thought you had done that?”

Will opens their son’s bedroom door and goes in, still pulling Mackenzie along gently behind him. The clothes are piled in the crib and a lot of the toys and other gear from the baby shower are still in their boxes, stacked on the floor or on the bookshelves.

“I had a list Will, you crossed it off the list,” Mackenzie complains. Almost whines.

“Yeah,” Will brings her into the room and guides her by the shoulders to sit in the plush armchair; one of the first items of furniture they bought for this room. “I didn’t quite get around to putting it all away properly,” he lies. He goes to gather up an armful of clothes and dumps them in his wife’s lap. She doesn’t have a particularly happy expression on her face and now he wonders if he completely miscalculated this move. This move, not finishing up with the nursery, was supposed to be so he could distract her with it while she was in labour and stuck at home, while they waited for the contractions to kick off properly, before they got the ok to go to the hospital.

Will crouches in front of his wife, placing his hand on her knee for balance and catches the distant look in her eye. “You ok?” He asks, even though he’s tried to refrain from that question most of the day.

“Yeah,” Mackenzie breathes, and her dark eyes focus on his. “That was a contraction.”

Is it creepy if he asks to feel one?

“It just felt a lot stronger than the others,” Mackenzie adds, letting out a breath. Will can see worry in her eyes but he wouldn’t know to ask her if that were normal. She doesn’t have a comparison, not really, and they’re supposed to get stronger. He’s not sure he read anything about contractions being strange enough to be concerned. She’s not in pre-term labour; this is supposed to be happening.

But still.

Mackenzie’s hand lands on his and her fingers are cold. She gives Will a turn of her lips that might have been an attempt at a smile, either to reassure him or herself, but falling flat on both counts. Will waits on her, not sure what to do or say. He senses now is not the time for a rallying cry of ‘hang in there!’ Whether Mackenzie recognises his distraction for what it is, or she’s just wants to straighten out the baby’s things before he gets here, she picks up a onesie from the top of the pile and starts to fold it.

Will stands again, his thighs burning (he should really hit a gym) and moves around the room to shift the lactic acid, while pretending to move things into place. He puts soft toys at eye height on the book case; several teddy bears, a puppy and a dinosaur.

“Do you remember where all this stuff came from?” Mackenzie asks from her chair. She’s made a little pile on the arm of folded clothes; they’re all onesies in varying shades of yellow, green, white and blue. So if he had a girl it would be ok to put her in blue? But if he has a son, there’s no sign of pink? Mackenzie folds a red onesie with green ducks on it and looks up at him.

“Not really. You wrote in the cards from the baby shower.”

“I did?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh,” Mackenzie says, and gives a frown.

“You forgot?” Will asks, coming to take the tidied clothes and put them in the drawers. The clothes are awfully small, especially when folded.

“I’m having a contraction,” Mackenzie says.

Will looks over at her, sees the concentration on her face, and is surprised. Didn’t she just have one a minute ago? Isn’t this supposed to take ages?

It was probably five minutes ago.

Will fights the urge to ask her if she’s ok. He puts the onesies away (assumes top drawer will be fine and gets more clothes from the pile. Should he suggest timing them? No, that’s already a stupid idea. They’re just starting. Or starting up again. He doesn’t know.

Christ, it’s going to be a long day.

Mackenzie comes out of her reverie, and holds out her arms for the next lot of clothes.

“Was it the same as the last one?” Will finally finds a voice.

“It felt about the same,” Mackenzie looks up at him. “It was close to the other one too. About five minutes?”

Will doesn’t know.

“Do you think?”

“Yeah maybe?”

“Probably too soon to get excited about timing them,” Mackenzie muses, taking a long sleeved body suit (like a onesie, but no legs, just the domes that do up over the crotch), striped black and white like Pugsley from the Addams Family. “Do you think he’ll fit into these clothes?” She asks, laying the body suit against her belly. It actually looks pretty small against her, but she might not be the best yard stick to measure against.

“We have bigger clothes though?” Will says, going to the crib to dig his way through, pulling out clothes that seem bigger, trousers and t-shirts, sweaters.

“I’d be sad if we couldn’t get him into this,” Mackenzie says and Will turns to see her holding up a onesie that looks like the suit the kid from _Where The Wild Things Are_ wears, with the hood and ears and little tail. She gives him a pout and folds it up, placing it on the pile of onesies, next to the pile of tops and the pile of bottoms she’s also already sorted out. Will tosses the clothes he found to his wife.

Max. That’s the name of the kid from _Where The Wild Things Are_.

Oh how he wished he could have escaped to another land from his bedroom.

“Am I doing all the work?” Mackenzie asks. Will shakes from his daydream and goes back to finish with his shelves. “I was teasing you,” Mackenzie adds.

“I know,” Will says. “Just thinking.”

“Heavy thoughts?”

“Some,” Will confesses, but he doesn’t want to worry his wife when she’s got something way more pressing happening to her. He doesn’t want to be maudlin right now.

His son could be born today.


	25. Chapter 25

His son probably won’t be born today.

Realistically.

With the way the contractions come and go, from five minutes to twenty, to fifteen to thirty (though, according to Mackenzie, they’re staying fairly intense, which Will thinks could be a good sign), Will realises this elusive ‘contractions every five minutes consistently for an hour’ that’s been rammed down their throats by Katherine and the hospital (before they’re allowed to go to the hospital), might take longer than he thought. Yes, he got the message from all the books and websites, birth class instructions, Dads at boot camp _and_ the instructional videos they watched, but still, it’s one thing to be told, and it’s another to experience how fucking slowly the clock is moving.

They finish with the nursery, properly this time, at three in the afternoon. Mackenzie claims she’s not tired, and doesn’t want to nap, which Will doesn’t think is a good idea (he thinks she might be too anxious to sleep), but she’s still contracting, which Will supposes is a good sign, and she hasn’t flipped out on him, so he can hardly insist they lie down, even if conserving energy would be a good idea. He’s read all the books and gone to the classes, but he’s still not quite sure what to do.

It’s only three o’clock. They have so much time to kill.

(He has no idea how much time they have to kill.)

After Mackenzie rearranges the clothes in the drawers, Will ushers her out of the room again. It’s ready, she can stop fussing.

“I’m not fussing,” Mackenzie says on a pout, but has no choice to back towards the door when Will nudges into the baby – a little cruel, but he knows it is a tactic that will get her moving. She won’t stand still and take it with the baby crushing her insides.

“Come on,” Will encourages gently. “Let’s go lie down.”

“I’m not tired Will,” she says, almost petulant.

“I am,” he says. “Come and lie with me for a change.”

She gives the slightest hint of a smile as she teases him for being old. In the living room she puts up a hand to fend him off, so he grabs her fingers and leads her towards the bedroom. He makes her lay down first, and helps her with the pillow, then asks her if she wants anything else and is comfortable. Amused, she answers she’s fine, so he goes around to his side and plops to the mattress and closes his eyes. He’s not sure he’ll actually fall asleep but he _is_ tired.

“I’m having another contraction,” Mackenzie says.

Will opens his eyes and turns his head towards her. Her dark eyes are steady on his and he can see a slight frown in her forehead. “Can I do something for you?” He asks and she shakes her head. “Don’t hold your breath,” he observes and she immediately lets out the air she was holding on to, and takes another deliberate breath in. “Are they painful?”

“No,” Mackenzie says softly. “But they’re definitely enough to get my attention.”

“What do they feel like?”

“Kind of like – you know how after you do a gym session and the next day your muscles hurt?”

“That _is_ pain,” Will points out.

“It feels like you’re aware of muscles you didn’t know you had.”

Oh.

“I’m suddenly aware just how big my uterus is.”

“I have no idea what that feels like.”

Mackenzie manages a small laugh.

Will turns onto his side to face her. “If you need me, you let me know.”

“I will,” she says lightly. “They’re fine. Just strange and I feel nervous,” she confesses.

“This is new,” Will says, meaning giving birth. Mackenzie pulls her lips into a quick smile.

“I’m excited though,” she adds.

“Me too,” Will echoes. She gives him a much more hopeful kind of smile and he wonders if or when the contraction ended.

Mackenzie’s phone starts ringing.

“I’ll get it,” Will volunteers. He sits up and reaches over her to the nightstand. If it’s her mother, he’s going to decline the call. It’s Katherine. He gives the device to his wife.

She answers it, her eyes catching Will’s as he moves to lay next to her again. “Hi Katherine.”

Mackenzie pauses as she listens.

“I’m ok,” she says lightly and then, “Actually, I think I could be in labour. I’m not really sure, but I’ve been having pretty regular contractions all – since this morning.” She looks at Will; he gives her a hopeful expression. “They’re not very consistent, but they’ve been rather sturdy.” She gives an embarrassed laugh. “At least three an hour so far.” Mackenzie listens some more and her fingers on her free hand find Will’s. He wonders if it’s good news that she’s hearing.

“I will. Of course,” Mackenzie says and hangs up. Will takes her phone, and she doesn’t protest. “Katherine said to wait and see what happens, and call her tomorrow to let her know. No induction today.”

“That’s great!” Will enthuses.

Mackenzie smiles widely, looking relieved and excited, her cheeks slightly pink. “I’m really glad.”

Will draws her hand to his mouth to kiss her fingers lightly. Mackenzie’s happy expression gets deeper. “Of course,” she says, sobering a little. “This has to keep happening,” she says, gesturing to her belly and Will wonders if she’s having another contraction already. He hopes so (but it can only have been five minutes).

Honestly? He doesn’t want to wait anymore.

 

 

**********

 

“You have to eat,” Will says gently.

“I don’t want to eat,” Mackenzie grumps.

Will turns his head slightly to see his wife. She has her eyes closed and a frown mars her forehead. She must be having a contraction. Two hours after Katherine rang, with the sun starting to set and turning their bedroom into twilight, and the contractions are still moving around a bit (not that they’re specifically timing them), but have at least kicked it up to four an hour. Mackenzie says they’re still about the same intensity, and they’re still relatively brief, but Will figures something else is going on. Perhaps how slowly labour is progressing, or that she’s coming up on twelve hours of it, or maybe it’s just that she’s annoyed that he talked to her when she was asleep (she said she wasn’t tired!).

When the contraction ends, and Mackenzie’s face has smoothed out, and her eyes flicker open, looking over at him from her pillow, he tries again. “You need to eat something.”

Mackenzie’s expression softens on his. “I know, but I don’t feel hungry.”

“I’ll make you anything.”

Her lips tighten in a very slight smile that he misses in the fading light. “I know you would, but I don’t know what to tell you. I’m not hungry, so I don’t really feel enthusiastic about suggesting something to eat.”

“Something though,” Will insists carefully.

Mackenzie reaches out a hand to his cheek. At first, she cups his jaw, then slaps her fingers against his cheek softly. “Ok, ok, I’ll eat something. Nothing heavy though.”

“So no carbs?” Will suggests, taking her hand, before she can assault him again. “Maybe some vegetables?”

“Mm, ok,” Mackenzie agrees.

“Maybe a little beef?”

“Ok.”

“Maybe a little chilli sauce?”

Mackenzie gives a chuckle. “Sure.

“So stir fry vegetables and beef, just no rice.”

“Sounds great.”

Will pushes himself to sit, releasing his wife’s hand. He stands from the bed and pulls the curtains closed. When he turns back to face the now dark room, he can see the shadowed figure of his wife getting out of bed. “What are you doing?” He asks, his tone slightly alarmed.

“Going to the bathroom,” Mackenzie shoots back. “Is that ok?” She steps off to the other room and Will feels sufficiently reprimanded. He goes to the kitchen and leans his hands on the bench, taking a deep breath, holding it for a second, then releasing is slowly and deliberately. He feels the way his heart beats in his chest for a moment, slightly fast, as oxygenated blood flows around his body, down his arms to his fingers, tingling, and in his toes, his faulty heart valve holding on and his son on the way. He reminds himself that this is Mackenzie’s show; her moment. He’s there for support, not control. He needs to keep his restlessness and anxiety in check, because this is not about him. He’s right to insist she eat, but she doesn’t need to be confined to bed. No harm is going to come to his wife or his son; their apartment is a safe place and they’re no more than ten minutes from _two_ hospitals. Moving around is going to be helpful to Mackenzie as labour progresses and he needs to relax. 

Breath taken, Will goes to the fridge and takes out the ingredients he’ll need to make dinner.

 


	26. Chapter 26

Will makes dinner bland. Even though there’s an old wives’ tale about chilli inducing labour, he doesn’t want to do anything to upset the process Mackenzie’s body is going through, so he uses the sauces and spices sparingly. She picks at her food, but she does eat it, and he takes heart that he’s managed to keep her refuelled. They try to watch television but there’s really nothing on that either of them are particularly interested in. They settle on a movie and Will falls asleep again, until there’s a loud explosion and he jerks awake. From the other end of the couch, where she’s laying, Mackenzie gives him an amused expression.

“What did I miss?” Will asks.

“Turns out that guy is working for the Russians,” Mackenzie answers.

“I meant with you,” Will says, sitting up further and reaching for the remote to pause the movie he couldn’t give a shit less about.

“I’m fine.”

“Still going?”

“Yes still going.”

“Are you ok?”

“Yes. They’re closer but they seem about the same.”

In the light of the television, Will can see the genuine expression on his wife’s face; she seems relaxed. “I’m sorry I fell asleep.”

Mackenzie smiles again. “Don’t worry about it. Would you rather we went to bed?”

“Do you want to go to bed?”

“I’d rather you talk to me. I’ve been alone with my thoughts for too long today.”

Will feels embarrassed. “Sorry.”

“No, not you. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking and I’m tired of thinking and waiting. Distract me.”

Will’s mind goes blank.

It goes blank, even though he prepared distractions.

“Play me something,” Mackenzie requests when he stares at her for too long. She jerks a chin towards his guitars, along the wall by the window.

“You don’t want to finish this?” Will gestures to the television, remote still in hand.

“No,” Mackenzie breathes and Will is immediately attentive to her. He can see the frown in her features, the way her body tenses. He wants to ask her if they should time them now, the contractions, but he remembers some websites suggesting they leave that until they think the contracts are really close together, and last for a long time. Otherwise, they might be disappointed if they’re not close to the magic five-minute mark.

He wants to rub her back, but he doesn’t want to smother; when he’s in pain, he doesn’t really enjoy people in his face. She said she’d ask when she needed him. He just hopes she’s not holding out for as long as she can, even while she’s suffering. He feels bad for sleeping, because even though she appears relatively relaxed, it looks to him that the contractions have gotten a little more intense.

Will shuts the television off and halves the light in their living room. A lamp is on next to the armchair and it casts an orange glow over them. It’s still plenty of light to see by, and Will can see Mackenzie’s face ease out of its frown. He gets up as her dark eyes open, and goes to get his acoustic guitar. “Any requests?” He asks softly, as he takes his seat on the couch again, lifting his feet to the coffee table so he has something to rest the instrument against. Mackenzie wiggles her toes in against his back, but doesn’t say anything. He rifts off for a moment, then settles into a bluesy chord progression.

“ _Mississippi, in the middle of a dry spell,_ ” he starts and looks over at his wife. She likes this song and when her eyes meet his, she gives him a slight smile. For a second, he’s taken back to another time and place, the deja vu strong and emotive; their first chapter.

He gets through Alannah Myles easily, and drops his hands to the strings to finish the song. He looks over at his wife, “What next?”

“Elvis.”

“ _We’re caught in a trap.”_

“Not this one,” Mackenzie requests.

_“I can’t walk out. Because I love you too much baby.”_

“Will,” Mackenzie whines.

 “ _Why can’t you see. What you’re doing to me. When you don’t believe a word I’m saying_.”

She sticks a toe into his kidney.

“Ow!” Will complains sharply, switching immediately to the song he knows she wants to hear. He picks out the introduction before starting to sing. “ _Wise men say. Only fools rush in. But I can’t help. Falling in love. With. You.”_

The key is just slightly no good for him. The deep parts are too deep and his voice fades to a whisper but that just adds to the effect of the song.

“ _Shall I stay? Would it be a sin? If I can’t help. Falling in love. With. You.”_

This song got her into bed once. Not that she took a lot of convincing. He sticks with picking out the piano melody. He doesn’t need to, but he looks at his fingers on the strings.

“ _Like a river flows, surely to the sea. Darling so it goes. Somethings are meant to be_.”

Mackenzie joins him for the last verse, the key wrong for her too, and he shouldn’t have said she was tone deaf, because she’s not, but her voice drops to a whisper in places too.

“ _Take my hand. Take my whole life too. For I can’t help. Falling in love. With. You_.”

Short and sweet. Those are all the lyrics.

“The baby can hear you.”

Will looks over at Mackenzie. She has a hand to her belly. “I can feel him moving.”

Will gives her a soft smile (he missed the contraction just before). He starts another song, in lieu of a request. “ _I am just a poor boy though my story’s seldom told.”_

He feels small with it, the weight of knowing his son is going to be here soon, tomorrow maybe, and he’s going to be a father. His whole life is changing and he’s equally scared and excited and he can’t believe there was a time when all of this was never going to be a possibility.

“ _All lies in jest, though a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest_.”

It was all his doing and he just can’t believe that he wasted all that time. Even when Mackenzie came home, he couldn’t swallow his pride and stop wasting time. If he had, this could be baby number two and baby number one could be asleep in his bed.

“ _When I left my home and my family, I was no more than a boy_.”

Will stops suddenly, and Mackenzie keeps humming for a second longer (he couldn’t hear her singing along). “Not this one,” he says roughly and looks to her for something else.

‘How I Got To Memphis’ floats through his mind but he doesn’t want to play Charlie’s song, a song about how he got to here. He knows how he got to here, and it’s not entirely a story of wonder and joy and he needs to be without the melancholy tonight. Not tonight and not tomorrow.

(Not ever, would be great.)

“Baba O’Riley,” Mackenzie calls out.

“With the world’s longest introduction?”

Mackenzie gives a slight laugh. “Hardly the world’s longest,” she counters.

Will cuts in with large, loud chords. “Forty-three seconds of harpsichord,” he says over his own guitar and Mackenzie wiggles a toe at his back again. “ _Out here in the fields! I fight for my meals_!” Will starts.

He wonders if their neighbours can hear him.

Who cares?

Mackenzie attempts some low key head banging as he plays. This song isn’t particularly suited to an acoustic guitar; the rhythm’s not right, but he does pick out the lead for the over a minute-long outro.

He’s already got the next one ready in his mind, and moves into it smoothly. It takes Mackenzie a second to recognise it, but she gives him a slow, happy smile when she does.

“ _Just a perfect day,”_ Will starts singing softly. _“Drink sangria in the park. And then later, when it gets dark, we go home.”_

Mackenzie likes this song too.

_“Just a perfect day. Feed animals in the zoo. Then later, a movie too, and then home.”_

They did this once. Will’s idea. Because he knew she liked the song. He was trying to be romantic. It worked.

“ _Oh it’s such a perfect day_ ,” Mackenzie joins him on the chorus. _“I’m glad I spent it with you. Oh such a perfect day, you just keep me hanging on. You just keep me hanging on_.”

Will picks out the melody, switching from the piano, to strings, from notes, to chords. Mackenzie sings the bridge softly, “ _You’re going to reap, just what you sow_. _You’re going to reap, just what you sow._ ”

And then she stops abruptly. So Will stops abruptly. Her face is contorted, not quite in agony, but definitely discomfort. Will reaches over and sticks his hand between her back and the couch, so he can rub at her spine.


	27. Chapter 27

By the time they go to bed (early), Mackenzie is definitely over the twelve-hour mark for labour (if that’s what this is), and still contracting away, somewhere around ten-fifteen minutes apart (they still have not timed them, and given how they seem to swing back and forth, closer to and further from ten minutes, there’s no point). Mackenzie lays on her side, facing the bathroom side of their bedroom, so that Will can massage her back. “Thank you,” she says. “That feels nice.”

Will presses a kiss to her shoulder and she attempts to reach back for him, but can’t bend her arm that way. Will shifts to press a kiss to the inside of her elbow and she twists her arm further back to curl her fingers around his wrist for a second, and then withdraws. The tension is back. The anticipation, that is. Not them bitching at each other. Will feels alert, despite the dim lighting of their bedroom, and wonders how he’s ever going to be able to sleep tonight. And then he wonders if Mackenzie will be able to sleep; putting aside the anxiety and the discomfort of being in labour, and he remembers that she asked him to distract her earlier. The best way to distract Mackenzie? Conversation.

She’s extroverted.

And she deals with tension and emotions by talking.

“Tell me about the houses you were looking at the other day,” Will says.

“Hm?”

He looks over her shoulder, but her eyes aren’t closed. She looks over at him and raises her eyebrows. He repeats his request and she blinks for a moment before looking to the stack of papers that are still on her nightstand. “I wasn’t really looking,” she says, dismissive, but not defensive.

But Will will not be perturbed. “Anything interesting?”

“Uh, not really.”

Will shifts his digits along her spine, using the ‘spreading out’ technique to relieve his fingers and wrist. “Any places in the city with a yard?”

“There were a few places,” Mackenzie acquiesces. “Tiny yards though.”

“Hardly room to throw a football?”

“No,” she gives a soft chuckle, mostly a sigh. “Nowhere to ride a bike.”

“How many bedrooms were you thinking?”

“Uhm,” she hedges again. “I – maybe three? You and me, the baby, and a guest room?”

“Sounds good,” Will encourages, working his way up and down her back.

“Houses though, not apartments,” Mackenzie adds.

“Sure,” Will agrees.

“Is that what you were thinking?”

“Sure,” he says again, but more enthusiastically. When Mackenzie doesn’t say anything else, he asks her whereabouts in the city she was looking.

“Somewhere close to work, and good schools.”

 _Which is where?_ Will thinks.

“Uh,” Mackenzie starts to explain, and then stops. For a second, Will wonders what the problem is, and then he quickly realises she must be having a contraction and shifts his hand to the small of her back, rubbing firm circles with the pads of his fingers. How strange is it that his wife is going through something that he cannot possibly comprehend? Right in front of him. And there’s nothing he can do about it. In fact, the weirdest part of it is that he encourages all of this. He _wants_ his wife to be having contractions, because it will mean his son is born. Of course, he doesn’t wish for her to be in pain, or in distress and so he finds himself in a strange position. But what can he control? He can help control the _level_ of discomfort she feels, so he increases the pressure slightly on his fingers in her back, watching her face to check to see if that made her feel worse (doesn’t seem to have, but she keeps frowning; eyes closed). And he can also try to diminish her distress by being encouraging and loving and supportive.

He hopes.

He knows the contraction has eased off when Mackenzie’s face relaxes again, and he shifts so he’s more behind her again, and not staring her down.

“East of Central Park,” Mackenzie says and Will takes a second to realise what she’s talking about. She’s picked up conversation right where she left off.

“That’s not closer to work,” Will points out gently.

“No, but there’s a really good school and the subway line runs directly south.”

He’ll take her word for it. Not that it matters. They’re not moving.

Yet.

“There’s some pictures there,” Mackenzie gestures half-heartedly at her bedside table.

“I’ll take a look later,” Will says, switching to his other hand.

“You don’t have to rub my back all night,” Mackenzie says.

“Well,” Will says lightly. He’ll try.

 

 

**********

_2 nd February 2014_

_Sunday_

_D-Day +8_

 

He makes it through two more contractions. And then Mackenzie falls asleep so he eases off, in case his touching her wakes her up. He lays there for a while, waiting for her to wake, to be honest, for the next contraction, but after half an hour she’s still asleep, so she’s either stopped contracting, or is managing to sleep through them. Either way, Will figures he should probably go to sleep too before the clock ticks over for midnight. He reaches back to put his light out and settles on his back, trying to keep his movements to a minimum. The room goes dark, save for the cracks of light around the edges of the bathroom door, but he feels wide awake. His eyes eventually adjust to the new level of illumination, helped by the lights of the city outside the windows, and he can easily make out the lump of his wife in bed next to him. 

He closes his eyes and focuses on his breathing. In and out. In and out. Nice and steady. Like Mackenzie should be doing when she’s having a contraction. He must remember to remind her. In and out. In and out. He conjures the image of Mackenzie and his son waiting for him outside of the prison, in the sun, their faces bright with smiles, and feels his lips turn up at the corners. He feels restless and forces himself to focus on his breathing again. Nice and steady. In and out. He imagines holding his son for the first time. Soothing him, like he did for the little girl at Daddy Bootcamp.

He falls asleep.

And then wakes again several hours later, not sure if something woke him or just if it was because his ass has gone numb from lying on it for too long. He turns over carefully, so as to not tug the blanket from his wife, and is preparing for sleep again when she makes a noise he knows definitely means she’s awake, and that she’s having a contraction. He reaches out his hand, fumbles against her back in the dark until he finds the right place, the small of her back, and shifts forward to rub circles against her flesh. She gives a whimper and croaks a thank you and he croaks back that she should keep breathing.

She huffs out the breath she was holding, and sucks in another. She lets that one out too, as slowly and as steadily as she can manage, while Will rubs circles into her back. For _ages._ And then the contraction eases off. “Thank you,” Mackenzie whispers. “That really helps.”

“How long have you been awake?” Will asks, his eyes gritty as he tries to make out her face in the darkness, with little success. He keeps his hand moving, using the ‘spreading out’ motion instead of pressure circles.

“Just now.”

“Did they stop? Or were you were sleeping through them?”

“I was,” Mackenzie confirms. “That one was really strong.”

“And long,” Will points out.

“And long,” Mackenzie murmurs, her voice cracking as she lowers it. “Did I wake you?”

“No, I woke a second before you did.”

“I could feel it coming.”

He doesn’t know what to say to that.

“Are you going to go back to sleep?” He asks instead.

“I need to pee,” Mackenzie groans, starting to push herself to sit. Will sits himself, throwing back the covers and trying to help her; difficult from his position behind her. He checks the time: 3am.

He helps his wife back into bed when she’s done with the bathroom and they settle again. She has another contraction, and Will rubs her back, reminds her to breathe, and she says it still felt strong, like the last one. Will can feel the heat emanating off her body; clearly she is doing much more intense work now. He feels like he’s starting to drift off between the next one, but is attentive when it hits. It’s quiet. Will can’t hear traffic and it’s too early for birds. Mackenzie’s silent and he wonders if she’s gone back to sleep. At the next contraction, it’s clear she has not, or, has been woken again. Will takes up rubbing her back again, and he can hear in the stilted way she breathes that things have kicked up a notch. When the contraction ends, she asks him what time it is.

Three-thirty.

So that’s three in about half an hour. Still not close enough. But stronger and longer is a good sign, if he can wish that on his wife. He falls asleep before the next one, and Mackenzie wakes him by asking if he’s awake. He starts rubbing her back, clearing his throat, “Sorry.”

“No, it’s ok, sleep if you want to.”

Hardly.

“Are you sleeping?” He asks.

“A little,” she replies, her voice tight.

“Pressure ok?”

“It’s good,” Mackenzie replies, panting a little. Will reminds her to breath steadily, encouraging her gently and she mimics him when he emulates ‘in and out’. The contraction eases off and Will let’s his hand still. Mackenzie whispers another ‘thank you’ to him and he gives a grunt that’s meant to say ‘I don’t mind’.

After that, he keeps quiet, and she either goes to sleep again, or just stays silent, because his mind starts to drift just before the next contraction, where Mackenzie tensing up next to him has him alert again, or at least awake enough to think to rub her back. The pattern repeats for the next few hours until Will notices that she’s back to making distressed noises as the contractions start; slight whimpers.

“They’re stronger?” Will asks, his voice rough.

“Yes,” Mackenzie grits out and Will notices she’s rocking back and forth slightly, her uppermost arm shifting back and forth, like she can’t get comfortable, and doesn’t know how to settle. Her shirt feels damp.

“You can’t sleep through them anymore?” Will asks, but it’s not entirely a question.

“No,” Mackenzie answers quickly. The contraction fades and she stills. “What time is it?”

Will looks over at the digital clock beside his bed. “Five a.m.”

It’s going to be a long fucking day.

Mackenzie gives a groan. “I need to move,” she says.


	28. Chapter 28

Will thinks she means she wants to get up and walk around, but she just wants to turn over to lay on her other side. Which puts them face to face. Will’s not happy about that arrangement, especially when the next contraction hits and he’s on the wrong side of his wife for back rubs. He has to sit and lean over her, and when it ends, he makes her shift to the middle of their bed so he can lay down behind her. Mackenzie throws the covers back to her hips, letting her torso get colder air and Will tries to awkwardly keep the blanket up to his chest, at least, in the cool bedroom. He rests his head on his wife’s pillow, and closes his eyes, wondering if he’ll drift off to sleep, and whether Mackenzie will, and whether they should try, or call it.

And then there’s silence as they wait for the next one.

Mackenzie sighs.

The silence stretches out.

“I found an Al Anon meeting near here,” Will says.

“What?” Mackenzie asks, her voice husky in the early morning. “When?”

“Thursday, I think.”

“Why wouldn’t you tell me that?” She asks sharply, turning back slightly to try and look at him.

“I’m telling you now,” Will says lightly.

“Ok fine,” Mackenzie says, but her tone is a little terse.

Will takes a moment, before he snaps back.

“Well, what was it like?” Mackenzie prompts when he says nothing, her tone slightly less stressed, but not by much. “Did you find it helpful?”

Will does a mental double take, and opens gritty eyes to make out the curve of her back in the crack of light coming through the bathroom door. He closes his eyes again. “I haven’t gone yet. They meet on Tuesday’s.”

“Why didn’t you go?”  
“I found them on Thursday,” Will repeats.

“Oh.” A pause, and then her tone is much softer, “Sorry, I thought you said –”

“Doesn’t matter. I probably won’t go this week either.”

“Why not?” Mackenzie asks surprised. “Habib thinks it would be good.”

“Yeah I know,” Will sighs. “But, we might be busy.” It’s a tidy excuse.

“I’m sure I’ll be able to cope without you for an hour or so,” Mackenzie says lightly.

“Just what every man wants to hear.”

“What’s that?”

“That you can cope without us.”

Mackenzie gives a short chuckle. “Only sometimes and only with certain things.”

“Procreating is a little tough on your own.”

“Just watch science figure out how to blend two ova together and we’ll be completely –”

“Go back to berating me for not telling you about the Al-Anon meeting.”

“I’ll go back to trying to convince you to actually _go_.”

Will’s silent for a moment, and Mackenzie lets him have it. Will sighs. “I’m working on it.”

“I’ll take that,” Mackenzie says firmly, and then she makes a noise of discomfort in her throat that clues Will in to the next contraction. Will works his fingers against her back and her breathing settles into deliberate and slow. This contraction seems closer to the last one, than the one before, but he’s still reluctant to start timing until Mackenzie wants to. It’s her show. He’s just in a supporting role. For the most part. Until she needs him not to be.

“Can’t do this without you,” Mackenzie says softly.

But Will thinks that she could, or she would at least try, and he’s not trying to be morbid, but it suddenly reminds him of a conversation he had with Charlie several years ago about being too old to be a father. And its thoughts just like that that scare him. He’s allowing himself to feel things, but sometimes his thoughts and feelings alarm him. And Habib thinks he’s ready to go it alone?

He shouldn’t be thinking about this now. His wife is about to give birth.

Mental change of subject.

“Do you wish your Mom was here?”

“Right now?” Mackenzie asks lightly, and Will knows he’s being teased.

“Sure,” he says. “Maybe not right this very moment, seeing as it’s the crack of dawn, but here, now, while this is happening?”

“You mean giving birth?”

“Yeah. Do you wish your mother was here?”

“For support?”

“Sure. Whatever. I don’t know.”

Mackenzie’s silent a moment. “I’m not sure,” she admits. “I think this is nice right now. You and me and it’s quiet.”

It _is_ quiet.

“So far you’re a pretty good distraction.”

“That’s good.”

They’re silent a moment.

“I think my mother might drive me nuts if she were here. She’d probably be saying I should get up and walk around or be doing something.”

Because walking is supposed to help with speeding up contractions, but Will doesn’t think they’re at that point yet.

“And telling me anecdotes about how fast her births were and how she did them better and what I should be doing, and how I’m doing it wrong.”

Will, with his eyes closed, frowns. What is this dissent?

Mackenzie sighs. “I need the bathroom,” she says flatly.

Will moves immediately, throwing back the covers and getting up, helping his very pregnant and probably in labour wife out of bed. He sits on the edge of the mattress, waiting for her to come back before he settles on going back to bed. It’s after five in the morning and the sun isn’t even up yet. Will wonders if he should go make coffee. Mackenzie’s taking her time. Maybe he should stop hovering outside of the door being a creep. And yet, he doesn’t have anything else to do at five am that does not involve his wife right now.

Will closes his eyes. He can feel his heart beating. He imagines sitting here with his son in his arms and it feels unreal but almost tangible. He feels so close, and Will knows, instinctively, that it’s today. He feels it in his gut; it’s his son’s birthday today. And right now, it doesn’t feel scary. It feels peaceful, and inevitable.

“Will?”

“Hm?” he opens his eyes and his wife is standing over him, an eyebrow cocked in curiosity.

“You ok there?”

“Yeah,” he reaches out his arms for her, framing her hips, moving his legs to the side so she can stand between them, so she’s closer to him. She leans her arms on his shoulders, one of their practiced positions for labouring, and it brings her face in close by his too, until she drops it to rest on her right forearm. Her hair falls into his face and she feels warm and heavy; real and concrete. “You ok?”

“I’m fine. Were you asleep?”

“Maybe.”

Mackenzie gives a ‘hmf’ of a puff of a laugh. “Go back to sleep if you want.”

“No,” Will says firmly and it stalls conversation. Good, he doesn’t want to argue about sleeping. “Everything ok with your mother?”

“As far as I know, why?”

“I meant with you and your Mom?”

“Yes,” Mackenzie repeats. “We haven’t had a row, if that’s what you mean.”

“You seemed…” he trails off. He’s not very good at this. Mackenzie leans back and cocks the eyebrow at him again, a silent demand that he finish that sentence. “Uh, a little… Like maybe there was some tension there,” he finishes cautiously.

“Not really,” Mackenzie sighs and straightens up. Will’s hands drop to his thighs as she steps away a few paces. She turns back to him, her expression hard to read with the light from the bathroom backlighting her face. “I just feel antsy and she doesn’t help me with that kind of thing.”

Will watches his wife silently for a moment, then gives a slight nod. He can understand that; he’s seen what Mackenzie and her mother are like around each other.

“Do you think your Mum would have come out for the birth? I don’t mean the birth, but, come out to see the baby?” Mackenzie asks, her voice a little strained.

Will gestures for her to come closer and she does so, standing between his legs again. He reaches to her back and rubs his fingers into the small of it, releasing some of the tension of the contraction he knows she’s experiencing.

(Was that one closer, or further apart from the last one?)

“She wouldn’t leave my Dad,” Will says.

“Your Dad isn’t here anymore.”

Will blinks up at his wife for a moment. His mother never left the farm, not if his father remained. They didn’t spend hardly a moment apart, which is not as romantic as it may sound. She never came to see him in New York, or Washington, or at college – not when he asked, and not when he offered to pay. But would she have come to New York, if his father had died first? “I don’t know,” Will answers and stops his fingers when he notices his wife’s face fall back to neutral as the contraction clearly ends.

Mackenzie curls her fingers around his ear and moves away again, pacing slightly. She stands still for a moment, then moves again. “I would have liked to have met her,” she says in the darkness of the corner of their bedroom.

“Me too,” Will says, looking down at his hands. “She would have liked you.”

“I hope so.”

“She would have,” Wills repeats, looking up to find Mackenzie has walked around the bed to the windows. She peeks out to the street and Will wonders what she sees. It’s five thirty, there can’t be too much going on out there, not even in the city that never sleeps.

Mackenzie sighs. “I think I miss the idea of my mother.”

“What does that mean?”

“I miss what she was like when we were kids. She seemed warm and strong and no nonsense and I learnt a lot from her about how to be assertive and smart.”

“What’s changed?” Will asks, thinking her mother is still like that, isn’t she?

“I don’t know. Last time we were there…” Mackenzie trails off and Will looks over his shoulder at her, still peeking out the curtains. It’s dark beyond the glass. “She seemed different, or maybe I was just seeing her in a different light.”

Still, Will wonders what she means. She saw her mother a few years before that – not a few decades.

“I think I just noticed things differently. I kept comparing their relationship to ours and I kept thinking ours came up trumps.”

“Do you think so?” Will caves and lays back against her pillows, linking his fingers behind his head. He does feel a little pleased.

Mackenzie steps back from the window and looks over at him. “Yeah. I don’t know how to explain it, but they seemed off. Or that maybe not everything was roses, like I _thought_ it was when I was a kid. But then, have I ever told you why I was the only one of us born in America?”

Will shakes his head. “No.” He figured it was because her father got the diplomatic post after Everett was born.

“Because when Mum was about to have Amy, she went home.” Mackenzie lets that settle between them and walks around the bed again. Will sits and she comes to stand between his legs, resting her hands on his shoulders. She doesn’t seem to be having a contraction, so he doesn’t rub her back.

“I didn’t know your Mom was pregnant with Amy when you were still in America.”

“She was. She took me and Everett and went home to have Amy. I was the only one of us born in America. She said she didn’t want two Yankee babies.”

Will wonders if that was meant to be an insult to America.

“But Susannah told me once that she was mad at Dad.”

“Why didn’t she take Susannah and Meredith?”

“They were in school.”

“What did your Dad do?”

“I’m not sure exactly, but he was very… absent.” Mackenzie straightens up again and moves away. Will watches her go, her steps slow, a proper waddle. “He was never around. As a kid, you don’t think much of that. But as an adult, now, when I think about it, Mum was alone in a foreign country with four young children and another one on the way and Dad was hardly to be seen.” She turns to him at the bathroom door.

“Your Dad _is_ a bit of an ass,” Will notes.

“What does that mean?” Mackenzie asks.


	29. Chapter 29

“What does that mean?” Mackenzie asks.

Will blinks a second, and then hurriedly tries to explain himself. “I just mean, he’s a certain – he’s a guy who –” He stops abruptly. There’s no good way to get out of this.

Mackenzie comes closer again, resting her hands on his shoulders once more. “He _is_ an arse,” she says, as if she’s just noticing for the first time now. Will looks up at her, not sure if he should agree, or now try and defend her father, so he looks like less of an ass himself. “I’ve never really noticed before, but last time we were there…”

Yeah, Will wasn’t particularly impressed by his behaviour then too.  

“That’s what you’re talking about?” Mackenzie asks.

“Uh,” Will says.

“I talked to Amy about his drinking.”

Will feels himself get suddenly warm. He’s starting to feel like he’s meddling.

“She said she’s definitely noticed he’s drinking a lot more. And that he’s grumpy. Especially with her kids. She thinks Mum and Dad have been fighting,” Mackenzie confesses, and straightens up again. Will reaches his hands to her hips, to keep her close. “I don’t know what’s going on, but something is.”

“You’re worried about it?” Will guesses.

“Sure, in some ways,” Mackenzie says, with a slight shrug. “But on the other hand, it’s not my relationship to worry about.”

“You don’t want your parents to split up though?”

“That’s up to them,” she says, loftily. “I can’t do anything about it from here.”

“And Amy wouldn’t get involved?”

“She has her own life. They’re grown-ups. If they want the name of a great marriage counsellor, I’ll be happy to recommend one, but I don’t want to act as their therapist, or interfere, or even get involved really. I’m kind of busy with my own life. If they’re not happy, they should work on it, or stay away from each other, and stop taking it out on everyone else.”

Will suspects there’s way more to this situation than Mackenzie’s sharing right now. But he stays quiet. He doesn’t want to interrogate her. He doesn’t really want to do anything to upset her right now (seeing as stress can stall labour), and wonders at the wisdom of having this conversation right now. He wonders if he can subtly change the subject.

Mackenzie sighs and brushes hair out of her face. “I just don’t need to be thinking about them at the moment, you know?”  
“Sure,” Will agrees easily.

“I mean, why can’t they just be nice to each other? And by each other, I mean, why does Dad have to speak to people that way?”

Will’s not sure.

Mackenzie sighs again. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It seems to matter,” Will notes.

Mackenzie pulls away from him and paces to the bathroom door, where she stops and turns back to face him, backlighting herself so he can’t see her face clearly again. “They’re my parents.”

“I understand.”

“They’re supposed to model how things –”

Ah, here it is.

“I don’t want –” Mackenzie sighs. “I know it’s probably entirely idealistic, but I want to be better than they were. For him.” She puts her hands over the baby, framing her abdomen. “You know? Proper role models. I know we’ve not been married _that_ long, but so far so good, and I just want to be able to show him that it can be a wonderful thing. That if we’re still married in twenty years, and I hope we are, that we still love each other and we don’t bitch at each other and seem like we’re pissed off at each other all the time.”

Will’s not sure he noticed her parents seemed pissed off at each other. Kind of detached and dismissive, sure. And yeah, her Dad was grumpy, but Will thought that was aimed just at him.

“I just really want to be a good Mum.”

“You will be,” Will says softly. His eyes hurt from looking into the light. And probably cos it’s really freaking early.

“I know we can stand here and say all these things, and it’s another to _actually_ make it a reality, but I really want to try.”

“Me too.”

“I really mean it Will.”

“So do I,” he says, a little indignant.

“Not just read the books, but actually do it,” Mackenzie insists.

“Then we will,” Will says resolutely.

“So you agree?” Mackenzie asks, turning against the doorframe so her back is against the wood. She squats slightly, and leans forward so she can rest her hands on her thighs, just above her knees.

“I agree,” Will confirms. He watches his wife a moment, unsure what she’s doing or what’s happening, trying to listen to her words, and decipher a meaning from what sounds, at the moment, like babble. She’s anxious, and she’s drawing him in closer. Not physically, but emotionally, because that’s what she does. So he sits and listens and tampers the desire to tell her that she’s asking him the same thing over and over. His job, as her secure attachment, is to reassure. “I completely agree with you.”

He also doesn’t point out that he’s been reading the books too, and that, even though they haven’t had a proper discussion about their content, he likes the ideas in them. He has no idea how they’re going to put them into practice either, and he doesn’t point out that they don’t _really_ need to be having this conversation now, because the parenting part will come later. He doesn’t just mean that Mackenzie has to give birth first, before they’re parents, he means that at the start, all the baby is going to need or want from them is food, sleep and a clean diaper.

When Mackenzie’s anxious, he doesn’t have to rationalise her fears.

“There are classes,” Mackenzie goes on.

“For?”

“Parenting classes,” Mackenzie clarifies. She looks over at him, her hair falling around her face for a moment, obscuring her features. She lifts a hand and slowly tucks it behind her ear so they can see each other again. “Would you go?”

“Of course,” Will immediately responds.

“You sure?”

“Yes,” Will says firmly. “Where is this coming from?” He finally asks. “I’m reading the books; I’m saying I agree with you.” He keeps his voice light, so that it remains a conversation, and not an accusation, but the implication is there: he’s feeling defensive by her insinuations.

“I just want to be on the same page.”

“We’re on the same page.”

“We haven’t talked about the books.”

“Well…” Will hedges. “No, but that’s not because I don’t want to. We just haven’t found the right time.”

“Now’s a good time.”

Will might argue that it’s not, really. He’s not sure if the conversation is helping or worsening her anxiety. Maybe if she talks it through, it will dispel on its own. “Ok,” Will says. “I liked that the stuff the,” he leans over to his wife’s nightstand and picks up the top book, the white covered book. “I like that this one is based on fifty years of research.”

“Me too,” Mackenzie says from the doorway.

Will flips the book over in his hands to look at the back. It’s just endorsements by other psychologists about the book, the author, and her theory. If someone’s done fifty years of research, they must know what they’re talking about; that’s enough time for someone to grow up with that style of parenting.

“I liked that it was following on from our counselling,” Mackenzie adds.

Will looks up to see her straightening up again. “Me too,” he agrees. “I could follow where it was going.”

“Yeah,” Mackenzie comes over and stands next to where he’s leaning on an elbow. He straightens up himself, so he’s sitting again. Mackenzie parks it next to him and takes the book, flipping through to where her page is marked. “And I think it builds on what we’ve already learnt,” she squints at him a little, as if she’s unsure. “But, I’m not sure I know how to practically implement some of those things. When we were with Dr Johnson she made us go through specific examples of the kinds of troubles we have.”

“Role playing,” Will supplies.

“Yeah,” Mackenzie says absently. She closes the book and gives it back to Will, but he indicates he’s done with it, so she puts it back on her nightstand.

Will reaches up to rub her neck lightly and she turns to him with a wary, but grateful, expression. “There must be someone teaching it,” he says.

“We’ll have a look?” She asks hopefully.  
“Sure,” Will agrees.

“Now?”

“Uh,” Will hesitates. “Sure.” He lets his wife go and stands. He heads for the door, and the living room, where the tablet is. When he comes back, Mackenzie is where he left her, sitting on the edge of the mattress, legs wide, her hands resting on her thighs again. She looks uncomfortable.

“Have you seen my phone?” She asks when he comes in.

“Uh, no,” Will flat out lies.

“I can’t remember where I left it.”

“It’s probably in the other room,” he lies again, hoping she’ll drop it and not ask him to find it. It’s in the drawer beside his bed, and he took it to stop anyone from harassing his wife about the birth. Now that she is (probably) in labour, answering questions about whether she’s in labour or not, are going to be harder; does she own up, and deal with other people’s excitement, or lie?

Will sits next to her again, flipping open the tablet’s case to bring the screen to life. He brings up a browser page. “What am I Googling?”

“Uhm,” Mackenzie says and moves to get the book again. She starts flipping through pages, then let’s all the pages feather through her fingers. She sighs.

“Ok, let’s start with the author,” Will says gently. “And see where it takes us.”


	30. Chapter 30

It doesn’t get them far. There’s no exact match between the book and any classes on offer, so they’ll have to find the best fit, and that will take time. Mackenzie gets restless and suggests they go for a walk, and Will resolves to find a parenting class for Mackenzie later, so she doesn’t worry about it. They take their usual track through Central Park, the landscape grey around them in the pre-dawn, lit in surreal pockets of light from lamp posts and street lights. Will looks up at their building and sees their bedroom light on; most of the other windows dark. There’s no one else in the park, or at least, they don’t come across anyone else on their trail, and Will would have been surprised if they had. It’s just after six a.m. on a Sunday morning.

Mackenzie walks _really_ slowly, a pronounced waddle that has her swinging her hips forward in an exaggerated gait. They stop half way around for a contraction that is strong enough to have Mackenzie leaning against the rail fence while Will jams his thumbs in her back (under her jacket). He’d suggest they turn and go home immediately, but at half way, it really doesn’t matter whether they keep going. He feels anxious to be away from the apartment, but logically, Mackenzie’s not about to give birth in Central Park, so he tries to keep control of it. Home feels safe though, and he doesn’t like seeing his wife in distress, which is a whole other thing, because this _has_ to happen. An awkward catch-22.

Mackenzie has another contraction on the street, just as they step back onto the sidewalk, which earns Will a sympathetic expression from a woman out walking her dog, while Mackenzie leans her hands against the fence again, and he presses his thumbs into the dimples of her back. He thinks the contractions have gotten further apart, even if they do seem to have gotten stronger. He worries about Mackenzie having a contraction crossing the street. He suddenly notices he’s hungry. As the contraction fades away, he checks the time. It’s after half six now and they’ve been awake a while. He needs to make sure Mackenzie has something to eat too.

The next contraction comes as they’re going into their apartment, which definitely feels like they’re closer together again, though when Will checks his watch, he suspects it’s been about ten minutes. They stop in the entranceway, with the apartment door still open, while Mackenzie breathes through the pain and Will sticks his fingers in her pressure points. He wonders why they call contractions contractions, when the muscle isn’t really contracting, but expanding, pulling her cervix open. He hopes none of their neighbours walk by and see them. He wants this whole process to hurry up.

Several hours later, after they’ve had something to eat (toast and tea, and then later fruit juice and more toast, because Mackenzie says she can’t stomach any of the other suggestions Will makes, like yoghurt and cereal), and they’ve showered and dressed again, Will’s wishing like crazy this whole fucking process would _hurry_ the fuck up. From five a.m. when Mackenzie woke him, until ten a.m. the contractions have finally settled into a ten minute rhythm. Yeah, in five fucking hours they’ve only just managed to get to the ten-minute-apart-consistent mark. They have to be at five before Will can take Mackenzie to the hospital (hospital’s policy – because labour could still stop at this point. And what a fucking joke that would be). Ten minutes is a really long time. Especially without a decent distraction, and Will has run out of them. They sorted the baby’s room. Googling parenting classes is too intense. Mackenzie won’t sit to watch TV (which they hardly do under the best circumstances anyway).

Will thinks this could be the hardest thing he’s ever done, and he’s not even the one in labour. So he also thinks he has no right to complain.

Mackenzie doesn’t complain though. She’s gotten pretty quiet (so that’s killed conversation, which is about the only distraction Will has left) and focused. Between contractions she moves around a little, sort of, half paces their bedroom, or the kitchen, or the living room. She tries napping, and Will thinks she might be sleeping between contractions. But as soon as they start she’s awake and insists on moving into a position more comfortable than laying on her side; hands and knees, bent over the mattress, leaning against her dresser. Will is on hand for every one of them, thumbs pressing into the acupuncture dimples in her back, and in between, he massages her neck and shoulders, her back and thighs. He hopes it’s helping. Mackenzie doesn’t complain.

He times the contractions with his watch and after an hour of ten-minute-consistent contractions, gently points it out to his wife.

“Hm?” Mackenzie responds.

“Ten minutes,” Will repeats, from behind her, ceasing to rub her back.

“Hm,” Mackenzie makes the noise again, in the inflection different this time, accepting. “What time is it?”

“Quarter past ten.”

“Call Katherine? Let her know.”

“Ok,” Will says. He doesn’t have to ask her for her phone, or the number, because he has her phone in his pocket. He takes it out and connects the call. Will puts the device on speaker.

“Hi, Mackenzie,” Katherine’s voice comes through the speaker. “How’s everything going?”

“It’s Will,” he identifies himself. “But I’ve got Mackenzie here.”

“Hi Will, how are you?”

“Good,” he answers, and feels a bubble of excitement ripple in his stomach.

“Still going?”

“Still going,” he confirms.

“How far apart are you now?”

“Ten minutes consistently, for the last hour.”

“Ok great!” Katherine enthuses. “Sounds like things are progressing. Are they getting more intense?”

Will waits for Mackenzie to answer, but when he checks, she has her eyes closed. “Yes,” he answers. “Definitely.”

“Have Mackenzie’s waters broken?”

“I don’t think so,” Will says. He’s sure Mackenzie would have said so. “No,” he says, more confidently.

“And you’re comfortable at home?”

“Honey, you’re comfortable at home?” Will asks her gently.

“Yes,” Mackenzie says, without any inflection at all.

“Ok, well hopefully things continue on as they are. When the contractions are five minutes apart, consistent for an hour, call me back and we’ll talk about moving to the hospital. If you feel uncomfortable about anything, you can call me or the hospital at any time. If you feel like things are getting too intense for you to handle, give me a call. If you’ve got any questions, give me a call.”

“Thank you,” Will says.

“Good luck! Good luck!” She enthuses and cuts the call.

From the bed, Mackenzie stirs. She looks over her shoulder to where Will’s sitting. “It’s nearly been twenty-four hours.”

“Yeah,” he says, trying to sound enthusiastic, but he’s not sure if he should be.

 

 

**********

 

Will quickly munches back the last of the apple and tosses the core in the trash (that’s him fed), and heads back to the bathroom. The shower is still running, and when he goes in, he can see Mackenzie is still under the water. He pops open the cubicle door and finds her leaning over the step at the end of the wet space, her bare ass greeting him, her head down. She hasn’t heard him come back in. “Hey,” he calls to her gently.

“Hey,” she answers.

“You doing ok?”

“Yes,” she says, but he knows the contractions have gotten much, much closer together, and it’s not going to be long before they go to the hospital. He’s excited, and nervous, bored and amped. Mackenzie was definitely sleeping between contractions for a few hours but Will didn’t feel sleepy in the slightest. He feels tired, more because he feels wary, and because this day started very early, after he didn’t have a lot of sleep the night before anyway (his fault for having a weird sleep schedule and work hours), but at the same time he feels alert, and coffee helps.

He props open the shower door with a rolled up towel again, and takes his seat on the closed lid of the toilet once more and picks up his spreadsheet and the tablet from the cistern. The spreadsheet is half filled with numbers tracking the contractions getting closer together and longer. They’ve been pretty steady, gaining half a minute here and there as the hours have gone by. Things are progressing, and he’s feeling certain that today is going to be his son’s birthday. He’s feeling calmly optimistic about that and after Mackenzie napped, Will feels like her mood has lifted a little too. She even managed to call him a nerd when she said she wanted to start timing contractions and he got his pre-prepared spreadsheet out.

It’s somewhat cruel to say he’s been bored, but he was. At least, when Mackenzie was napping and he was just sitting there, he was. Then he commandeered the tablet to look for those parenting classes (and might have found something to show her much, much later), and then went through the websites again to make sure he was covering all he needed to as birth partner and general caregiver. Mackenzie’s trusting him and he wants to do this right, especially when she sacrificed having someone experienced in there to help guide her. So, he’s remembered to feed her and give her water (she even has a sippy bottle with her in the shower). He reminds her of positions to try and help ease her pain, such as the shower, which she has now spent close to an hour in. He reminds her she’s amazing. He tells her she’s strong. He joined in for the mantra ‘my body is designed to do this’. He encouraged her to vocalise (until she told him it made the contractions reverberate in her throat – and then he encouraged her to stop). He’s gone over potential interventions, and how Mackenzie wants them handled (if not medically necessary: no; if medically necessary: ok). He’s periodically checked both their phones to intercept texts or phone calls from nosey parties (one text from her Mom; he said everything was fine, which is not a lie – and he did tell Mackenzie she text, so he didn’t really lie to her either).

He’s spent a lot of time with his own thoughts, and he’s successfully diverted most of them away from ‘wholly fuck what if I can’t do this!’ to ‘if Mackenzie can do this, you have to do this’. Mackenzie does talk to him though. She tells him when the contracts start, peak and fade, and then when the next one comes in. She tells him when she’s hot, cold, feeling weak, feeling like she’s coping, not coping, needs the toilet, needs to be sick, wants to get in the bath, wants to get out of the bath, on a scale of one to ten how much pain she’s in, and that the shower is doing it for her. Everything centres around the labour. He wasn’t looking for stimulating intellectual conversation from her anyway. Not today. He’s never been particularly afraid of the silence.

It’s just after two o’clock in the afternoon and Will has no idea what’s happening in the world outside of this bathroom. Mackenzie warns him a contraction is coming and he looks down at his watch, with the second hand, to note the time. If he’s timed this right, his quick run for an afternoon snack would not have missed a contraction, and so he fills in the next slot in his spreadsheet. He hears Mackenzie make her way through the contraction, breathing and a few low moans (a cuss), and can see her rocking back and forth gently, head down. She gags and spits and cusses again but Will can’t see anything’s come up and he wonders if she should eat again, because it’s been several hours now since she last had food, or whether that would just make it worse.

“It stopped,” Mackenzie says shakily, from the end of the shower.

“Ok,” Will acknowledges immediately. He checks his watch and notes the time on the sheet and then waits for the next one to start so he can note that too. At four minutes, thirty-seven seconds since the first one started, Mackenzie tells him the next one is building again. Will notes that down and checks up the column at the groupings. He’s satisfied that they’re at five minutes consistent. Not on the dot, but nothing over five minutes and fifteen seconds. He feels his stomach tighten with excited nervousness, and a hot wash of energy cascades over him.

“Honey,” he calls to his wife gently, standing from the toilet and going to the shower cubicle door.

“Yeah?” She says from the end of the shower, the warm water pounding down on her bent back.

“I’m going to call Katherine again. I think we should go to the hospital now.”

“Ok,” Mackenzie says.


	31. Chapter 31

Will calls Katherine, then the hospital, then the car service. Katherine is further way than they are, but promises she’ll see them shortly (she sounds enthusiastic and excited). The woman he speaks to on the phone at the hospital is kind, and also excited for them. She tells them to come in any time and all the staff will be ready. He can bring Mackenzie straight up to Labour and Delivery, and by-pass the emergency department (where all usual hospital admissions have to go through). She reminds him to bring their insurance details and identification. Will remembers to ask if there are any private rooms available and she says there are so far. Will hopes no other pregnant couple snags it before he can (he hates the ‘first in, first served’ policy – not when he wants his wife to be most comfortable).

After phone calls are made, he packs the last minute things into the hospital bag; the contraction spreadsheet, their deodorants, medications and toothbrushes. Then he goes to get Mackenzie out of the shower. He has a warm towel ready and helps dry her off, switching to rubbing her back when the contractions hit, and she doubles over to lean on the closed toilet, moaning slightly. He helps her dress. He helps her use the toilet. He helps her into shoes and into a jacket. He reaches under the jacket to stick his fingers in the pressure points in her back when a contraction hits at the front door. Mackenzie’s skin feels hot.

They manage it to the elevator, and Will thinks to check his phone to see if the car service text to say they’ve arrived. Otherwise, they’re going to have to wait in the lobby, or on the street, and he’s struck with a sudden panic that he’s messed up the timing. He puts the hospital bag down and takes his phone from his pocket, one hand on Mackenzie’s back, while she leans against the elevator wall, her forehead pressed to the cool surface. It’s ok. The text is there; the car is waiting.

The elevator pings open to an empty (thank god) lobby, apart from the doorman. He looks up from his desk and sees them and Will quickly jams his phone away before encouraging Mackenzie out of the car. He stoops to pick the hospital bag up as the doorman comes over, offering to take the bag for him. Will lets him, guiding Mackenzie out to the street, where the car service has pulled up right in front of the building, waiting for them. When the driver spots them coming out he pops the trunk and opens the back door. Will walks Mackenzie straight over to it, and helps her in. He turns to make sure the doorman (whose name he’s forgotten – it’s not Peter, it’s the other guy) has put the bag in the back (he has) and shakes his hand to thank him. He wishes them luck. Will thanks him again and gets in the vehicle next to his wife. She’s snuck across to the other side and put her seatbelt on and she’s in the middle of a contraction.

For a second, Will doesn’t know what to do. She’s clearly in a lot of pain and he can’t get to her back. He also can’t encourage her to move to a better position; their driver is already starting the engine. Instinctively, Will slides a finger into his wife’s grasp and she immediately clamps down on it. He tries for her back anyway, having to jam his hand between her back and the car’s seat, and wiggle in, because she’s pressing her body weight back. He’s not sure he’s doing much, and he definitely can’t get to her pressure points, but as the car swings into traffic, he gets a half-hearted back rub in to what seems like the longest contraction yet.

Mackenzie’s face gets increasingly red and she breaks out in a sweat and Will doesn’t give up on trying to comfort her (though he does, gently, remind her to breathe, instead of holding her breath), even though he’s not wearing a seatbelt. The driver confirms their destination with Will and gets them there in under ten minutes (Will’s not sure if he sped, or traffic happened to be on their side). There’s a brief reprieve between contractions, where Will manages to get his seatbelt on, and Mackenzie shifts around on the seat trying to get comfortable (and failing) but as they pull up to Weill-Cornell New York Presbyterian Hospital in Lennox Hill, Mackenzie has another strong contraction that means they all have to wait for her outside the front of the building.

“All right, fuck, let’s go,” Mackenzie finally huffs. Will undoes her seatbelt, and his, and gets out of the car. He goes around to the other side to help Mackenzie out and around the vehicle, and up on to the pedestrian area. It’s overcast, but it’s not raining or snowing. All the same, Will doesn’t want Mackenzie to trip on the curb. He hovers, and he hovers hard, but Mackenzie doesn’t shrug him off, and leans on him a little as they start to move inside. Will takes the bag from the driver, who has been waiting patiently on the sidewalk, and thanks him, and then they head into the building.

Ironically, it would be quicker for them to get to the Greenberg Pavilion that houses Weill-Cornell’s maternity wing through the emergency department. But, because they pre-registered Mackenzie, and Will has called the hospital to say they’re on their way in, they have to go around, through the main entrance, to end up on the other side of the emergency department after all. The hospital’s interior is decorated like an upscale hotel, except the building materials are linoleum, and sterility, instead of marble and luxury. Will hardly pays attention to the surroundings, not even the signage, remembering exactly where to go from several months ago, when they came for their visit. They have to go up to Labour and Delivery on the seventh floor, and just as the elevator doors are closing, a voice calls out to ask them to hold it. Will reaches for the button to reopen the cars doors and a group of five gets on, crowding Mackenzie into the back corner. Will instantly regrets letting them on. He regrets it more when the three children in the party jump up and down and scream at each other, even though it’s clear Mackenzie’s labouring in the back (well it would be clear if they bothered to notice). At least, it should be obvious to the two adults with the children (perhaps their parents, perhaps not), one of whom is holding a bunch of flowers (so Will deduces they’re there to visit someone who’s recently had a baby – if they are the parents of those children, the definitely fucking know what a labouring woman looks like, and Will swears to god his children are going to be courteous and aware of their surroundings. This child. That Mackenzie’s about to give birth to. Shit.).

Mackenzie presses her forehead against the elevator wall and leans on it as much as possible in the cramped space. Will tries to hold on to their bag and press his fingers into her back. The span of his hand fits easily, thumb in one dimple, middle finger in the other, but he can’t get as much pressure behind it as he could with two hands. Mackenzie’s skin still feels hot. The elevator ride is, thankfully, short, and as soon as the doors open again the kids run off, their parents hurrying after them without a second glance to their elevator companions. Will puts the bag down and brings his other hand to really massage the pressure points of his wife’s back and she gives a slight moan. He’s not sure if it’s a contraction (seems too soon, unless they’ve suddenly leapt ahead) or whether she’s just feeling wary, but he has to nudge her to get her moving again (and he has to stop the elevator from being called to another floor). They walk slowly, _really_ slowly, around to the reception area and are greeted by a young woman at a small desk.

She calls for someone to get a wheelchair for Mackenzie straight away, and one appears as Mackenzie presses her forehead down to the desk and moans again; she rocks her weight from side to side. Will dumps the bag and presses his fingers into her pressure points. The woman at the desk gives Will a smile. “What was the name?” She asks pleasantly.

“McHale, Mackenzie. M-C-H,” he says. “She’s pre-registered.”

The woman clicks at her computer for a moment. “Yes, ok I have it here. And Dr Mottola has called and is on her way in.”

‘ _Good_ ,’ Will thinks. “Do you still have private rooms available?”

“Let me have a look.” She clicks away again. “Yes we do. Do you have a credit card?”

“Yes,” Will says but he doesn’t move his hands from his wife’s back.

The woman on the desk gives him another patient smile. The orderly with the wheelchair waits to the side. The woman on the desk does some more clicking. “You brought your insurance card and ID?”

“Yes,” Will says again.

They wait some more. Another nurse arrives to hover.

Mackenzie lifts her head and notices everyone waiting on her. “Sorry,” she says softly, her voice husky.

“No honey, you’re fine,” the young woman behind the desk says.

“Take your time,” the other nurse says. “Just when you’re ready.”

“I’m ok,” Mackenzie straightens up further and the orderly brings in the wheelchair. Will helps her sit back in it, and the newly arrived nurse says she’ll take Mackenzie down to triage and get her started. Mackenzie shoots Will a panicked expression but he promises to be along shortly. With the young woman, whose name tag he can now see says ‘Anna’, Will goes through the check-in process. He hands over all the documentation they need, and his credit card to pay for a private suite. When everything’s sorted, he goes to find his wife.

She’s in a room by herself, on a narrow bed, foetal monitors strapped to her bare belly and a sheet over her lap, identification tag already on her right wrist. She’s in a hospital gown, lying slightly on her side, and the clothes and jacket she was wearing when she came in are on the end of the bed. She has her eyes closed and am almighty frown creases between her eyebrows. She looks over as he comes in and her expression changes to relieved, reaching out her hand. Will takes it, and puts their bag on the end of the mattress, avoiding her feet, then reaching behind her for her back. When the contraction ends, Mackenzie squeezes his fingers. “You ok?” He asks.

“Everything ok?” Mackenzie asks a split-second after him. “I feel hot,” she answers him.

“It’s sorted,” Will says and then leans down to shift the sheet from Mackenzie’s feet. “Is that better?”

“Yes, thank you,” Mackenzie says on a sigh.

Will notices the throbbing sound in the room and suddenly clicks it’s the baby’s heartbeat. His son. He looks at the print outs coming from the machine and Mackenzie explains one is the baby’s monitor and the other, the sheet of paper that looks like an ECG, is recording her contractions. As far as Will can tell, there aren’t any major hills on the readout that suggests Mackenzie had one while they were separated (apart from that one he just walked in on). So, that’s good; he’s keeping his streak up. He asks if he can do anything for Mackenzie as a doctor comes in, flicking the curtain back to cover the doorway and afford them some privacy.

“Hi, I’m Kim,” she introduces herself, while slipping on latex gloves, and Mackenzie starts having a contraction (he quickly tugs his hand free and gives her a finger to death grip, and reaches over her to rub her back). “I’m going to do your internal exam; see how you’re going.” And then she has to wait there for the contraction to end.

Mackenzie lets Will’s hand go and he moves out of the way in the small room. Kim gets Mackenzie to move to her back and rest her feet on the narrow mattress of the bed, so her knees create an A frame. Without much ado, she lifts the sheet out of the way and Will notices Mackenzie’s not wearing underwear. The doctor puts two fingers in Mackenzie’s vagina and feels around, to Will’s horror (having a baby is fucking invasive). She withdraws quickly and strips her dirty glove off, and pops the sheet back in place. Mackenzie shifts to her side again and they have a quick chat about when the contractions started, how Mackenzie’s feeling, whether she’s had any complications with the pregnancy, if this is her first, and so on.

“So you’re at six centimetres dilated,” Kim says. “So we’ll get you admitted and into one of the labour rooms.”

‘ _Thank god_ ,’ Will thinks, because there’s no way he wants to take Mackenzie home again, who happens to be having another contraction right now. He can tell from her face and the way she zones out from what the doctor says. He wants to get in there and help her out, but short of shoving the doctor out of the way, he doesn’t feel like he can. Kim checks the print out as it records the contraction and notes that it was a good, long, strong one. Makenzie groans and breathes her way through it, and Will moves closer anyway. He can see the printout recording a large mountain to match the other ones already on there.

“Baby won’t be too far away,” Kim adds. “A nurse will come in to start an IV and take bloods.” She gives them open expressions, inviting questions but Mackenzie isn’t paying attention to her, and Will’s trying to pay more attention to his wife than the doctor. This is all pretty routine so far. This is what he’s been expecting. But when she’s gone, Mackenzie’s dark eyes pop open and she gives him a steady look. “Did she say an IV?”

“I think so.”

“What’s the IV for?” Mackenzie asks, sounding a little panicked, trying to shift higher on the bed. Will adjusts the sheet for her, so her feet are free again. She looks pale. Paler than usual.

“I’m not sure,” Will says softly. “I’ll ask.” He moves to rub her lower back, trying to soothe her away from the edge of alarmed. “You ok?”

“I feel sick.”

“You’re going to be sick?” Will clarifies. He does a quick glance around the room, but can’t see any receptacles appropriate for being sick into.

“No, I don’t think so. It’s very warm in here.”

Will moves the sheet off her legs further, exposing shins and a little thigh, but trying to keep her dignity. He moves to quickly put her clothes and underwear in their bag, laying her jacket over the top. While they’re waiting for someone to do the IV, Mackenzie has another contraction. The other nurse comes back in with a plastic kidney dish. “I’m just going to pop in that IV,” she says, putting the dish on the trolley of monitors next to Mackenzie.

“What’s that for?” Will asks. He means the IV.

“We need to have access to a vein, for medications or fluids,” the nurse says genially. Will can see her name tag says ‘Janet’.

“Mackenzie really doesn’t want any interventions,” Will says firmly.

“We need to have access to a vein,” Janet repeats, turning to him with a steady gaze.

Will senses a shit fight about to brew and he takes a second to check himself, before he wrecks the situation. In that second, he comprehends what she’s said better. “You’re just going to put a hep lock in?”

“Yes, if you don’t want any pain medication, that’s fine. We need to take blood though. And if something happens, then it’s preferable to have instant access to a vein.”

“That’s fine,” Will concedes. He can understand that, though he doesn’t want to think too much about needing to use it. Mackenzie has her eyes closed again.

Janet puts a latex glove on her right hand. “Are you left or right handed honey?” She asks Mackenzie.

“Right,” Will answers.

“Ok, let’s try for the left,” Janet says and starts to put a tourniquet around Mackenzie’s arm. Mackenzie’s eyes come open and she bends her arm away, looking to Will.

“They need to put a hep lock in,” Will tells her, taking her other hand with his, her fingers are cool despite her claim of being hot. He can see a dusting of pink in her cheeks that belays her body temperature. The room does feel warm. He is still wearing his jacket though. He hasn’t even thought to take it off.

“What for?” Mackenzie asks, still not relinquishing her arm. Will explains the emergency aspect of it to her before Janet can, and she gives in. Janet puts the tourniquet on and finds a vein relatively easily. She takes a vial of blood and leaves the catheter in place. Mackenzie experiences another huge contraction and this time Will has no qualms about gently nudging Janet out of the way so he can get to the pressure points in his wife’s back.

“Are you doing the acupuncture?” Janet asks.

“Yes,” Will says, maintaining an even pressure in his fingertips. “Are you able to give me something for Mackenzie to be sick into?”

“Is she going to be sick?” Janet asks.

“No, she said she felt a bit nauseous,” Will clarifies.

“Ok, sure, I’ll bring something back,” Janet says. She doesn’t. In fact, Will never sees her again (and he’s kind of glad; no instant shining there). A different nurse comes to take Mackenzie to her labour room. Her name is Casey, and she’s on shift this afternoon. She’ll be checking in on them periodically and will be with them throughout the delivery. She disconnects the monitors from Mackenzie (and puts the contraction printout into her pocket) and helps Will help Mackenzie into a wheelchair. She pushes, while Will carries the bag to the new room further up the corridor. It’s ugly, painted an awful pale green, and it’s unimpressive – but it’s meant to be state of the art, so Will supposes it doesn’t matter what the room looks like, so long as it’s functional.

They help settle Mackenzie in the bed, and Casey shows them how the controls work. The bed goes up and down, the head will rise and fall, the foot of the bed does the same; it will even tilt to one side to give Mackenzie a graded plane to lean on, if she wants. To the side of the room is a little annex where their son will have his first check over, and there’s other equipment in with them, monitors and other things Will doesn’t know about. Will asks her for a sick bag and she shows him where the plastic containers are kept. She also points out the bathroom (with shower), TV, where he can play music, the call buttons in case he needs someone (but she has a private cell number that he can call to get her directly – and he should), and towels and pillows. She asks him to please call for her if he’s concerned about anything, and to try and make sure Mackenzie keeps her fluids up, but reminds him that she shouldn’t be eating. She also reminds him to take care of himself, and he nods. He knows, but it doesn’t hurt to be reminded. He checks the hospital and staff have a copy of their birth plan. Casey confirms they do and she’s just had a read through it, so she knows what their wishes are. She tells Mackenzie (who has her eyes closed and is not listening) she’s doing really well and she’ll be back when Dr Mottola arrives. Will’s just about forgotten about Katherine all together. He’s been side tracked by the change in scenery and pace of coming to the hospital. It’s exciting that it’s all moving forward, while increasingly becoming heavy with reality. Casey leaves.

For a second, it’s quiet.

It’s three thirty seven p.m.


	32. Chapter 32

Will looks down at his wife, who seems like she’s asleep (but can’t possibly be?), and whips off his jacket. He takes his jersey off too, leaving him in the flannel shirt he threw on when he dressed absently that morning, and feels much cooler himself. He moves their bag to the bench opposite the bed, and zips it open, refolding Mackenzie’s clothes from that day and tucking them in more securely. He takes out the bottles of berry-flavoured water Mackenzie wanted (plain bottles for him) and one of the boxes of granola bars he packed for himself to snack on. He opens one as Mackenzie calls his namely weakly from the bed. He turns and hurries back over, the food in his mouth, and saliva building rapidly around it (and spilling out of his mouth a little); he’s hungry. He goes to Mackenzie’s back and rubs his fingers against her spine, in the lowest dip of the small of her back, while he takes a bite from the bar and tosses it to the sheet so he can get both hands into the pressure points of her back. It takes him a moment to find them, through the hospital gown, while he chews, and Mackenzie makes distressed noises, breathing in a funny pattern. She keeps making them, even when Will finds the right place and he can see her left hand gripping the edge of the mattress, turning her fingers white. For a second, he feels panicked; if he can’t help ease the pain at this point, before things get worse (and they will get worse), then maybe Mackenzie will need some pain medication after all.

“Fuck,” Mackenzie says and pushes herself to sit suddenly, swinging her legs to the edge of the mattress. “I need to move,” she says tightly, shifting quickly to stand and turning so she can lean over the bed. And all before Will has a chance to react. She presses her face down to the sheet and spreads her legs further out. Will moves around the bed to lower the hospital gown for her, because she’s flashing bare ass at the entrance to their room (but the door is closed) and rubs her back again. Mackenzie gives a moan but doesn’t sound completely out of her mind. Will eyes up the granola bar, while picking dried apricot out of his teeth with his tongue. It’s too far away from him to reach from here. He waits patiently for Mackenzie. Eventually, she turns her head to the side, and eyes closed, says, “What’s that smell?”

“Disinfectant,” Will responds, leaving her back alone. That’s what the hospital smells like to him. Stale air and disinfectant.

“No, it’s sweet. Like apricots. Are you eating apricots?”

“They’re in my granola bar.” He picks it up and jams the rest in, chewing awkwardly, but trying to be quick. Is he cruel for eating in front of her when she’s not allowed food anymore? Or is it the smell? He takes the wrapper to their bag and jams it back into the box.

“Oh.”

“Want some water?” Will tries, picking up one of her bottles. He twists the top open to see if there’s a foil seal, and removes it.

“Not really,” Mackenzie says. She’s still leaning with her head on the bed, with her eyes closed. Will puts the lid back on the bottle, and puts it on the mattress near her anyway.

“Are you feeling better?” He asks, moving around her to get to the bed controls.

“I guess,” Mackenzie says, sounding hopeful. Will lifts the height of the bed so she’s not leaning down on it. “Oh that’s better, thank you.”

Will looks up on the wall for a clock and finds one opposite the bed. Good, he can time some contractions. He goes to get water for himself, using it to rinse out his mouth, and remembers the plastic containers to be sick in. He gets one and puts that on the bed too, and is just in time for the next contraction. He looks up at the clock and notes where the large minute hand is, and where the red seconds hand is, and presses his fingers into the dimples in Mackenzie’s back. He can hear her breathing steadily, but there are no distressed noises, and she keeps her head resting on the bed, her face towards the bathroom door. Will can’t quite see her expression, but he can tell she’s more relaxed about this contraction. He can tell when it peaks, because Mackenzie switches to deep breaths in through her nose, and forced out through her mouth. She hums a little, like she’s counting the timing of the air moving in and out of her lungs. As the seconds hand approaches the sixty second mark, Will can feel the tension washing out of his wife’s body, and knows the contraction ended. He shifts to rubbing her back, moving up along her spine, using the spreading out technique, so he can keep watching the clock. The next one starts two minutes later. That means the contractions are three minutes apart. Mackenzie’s six centimetres dilated already.

Wow. Moving to the hospital has really sped things up.

Will thinks about encouraging Mackenzie to walk around some more. That might really get things moving. He reminds her to drink this time, instead of asking her if she wants to. She sticks her hand out to him and he moves to pop the top on the water bottle, and puts it in her hand. She puts it blindly to her mouth and takes a sip. She hangs on to the bottle and Will moves all the way around her to take the pillow from the top of the raised portion of the head of the bed. He gets her to lift her head so he can put the pillow under it, and she thanks him. She takes another sip of her water. Will eyes the clock. The next contraction should be starting soon. He moves back into position and he’s right. Mackenzie moans a little as it starts and Will presses his thumbs into her back.

“More,” Mackenzie requests softly, so Will presses harder. That seems satisfactory. At the peak of the contraction, Mackenzie starts breathing heavily, in through her nose and out through her mouth, gripping the plastic water bottle tightly. When it eases off again, she releases. So does Will. He takes his flannel shirt off, leaving just the grey tee underneath; it’s rather warm in the birthing suite. He asks Mackenzie if she’s ok in the hospital gown. It feels like thick material. She says she is. Will puts his shirt in the bag and comes back for the next contraction. In between the next one, he encourages Mackenzie to have more water and rubs her shoulders and neck. Her skin feels clammy. He’s not sure about that hospital gown at all.

Ten contractions later, they’re passing four o’clock and Will’s hungry again. He needs to have something more than a granola bar (or the whole box of granola bars). He wishes he had a sandwich before they left the apartment. They’ve been standing in the same spot the entire time, and his legs are a little sore. He alternates between his fingers and thumbs, but honestly, they’re starting to ache a little too. But compared to what Mackenzie’s going through, he has no legitimate complaints he would say aloud. If she can do that, then he can do this.

There’s a tap on the door and Will cranes his neck around to see who’s coming in. It’s Dr Mottola. She gives him a bright smile. “Hi,” she greets softly.

“Hi,” Will echoes. Mackenzie has not moved in the last half hour. “Honey, Katherine’s here.”

She doesn’t answer him.

“How’s everything going?” Katherine asks him, watching as he stands with his thumbs jammed in his wife’s back. Casey comes in behind her and moves around the bed to start setting up some of the monitoring equipment. Katherine notices him looking and explains that they’re just going to check on the baby quickly, pop a foetal monitor on for a few contractions, and check Mackenzie’s blood pressure.

“Ok,” Will says, nodding positively, answering her question more than enthusiastically agreeing to the monitor. He feels the contraction ease off in the way Mackenzie’s body relaxes slightly. “Honey, Katherine’s here,” he tries again.

Mackenzie opens her eyes and looks over.

“Hi,” Katherine greets her. “Look at you, you’re doing so well!” She enthuses. Mackenzie straightens up from the bed a little. “No, don’t move if you’re comfortable,” Katherine puts out a hand to stop her. “How are you doing?”

“Coping,” Mackenzie says, upright anyway, leaning her hands against the bed, favouring her left with the catheter in her vein. Will has to help Casey cajole Mackenzie into moving so they can put the monitor on but she seems interested in hearing the baby’s heart rate going up and down with the contractions, even though she’d rather be bent over the bed; Will does his best with her standing up right. Katherine and Casey consult the read out on the monitor and claim everything’s just fine.

“So long as Mackenzie’s doing ok, and you’re coping,” Katherine says to him. “Then we’re ok.”

Will nods. “So far so good.”

Katherine gives him a smile. “Great. I really just wanted to come in and let you know I have arrived.”

“Thank you,” Will says.

“If you need anything, let Casey know; she’s going to be with you through this.”

Will nods again, as Casey gives him a friendly smile, and starts putting the equipment away again.

“If you’ve got any questions or concerns, I can come in and talk to you.”

“Thank you,” Will says again.

“You speak up if you need anything,” Katherine says firmly. “Everything’s progressing exactly as it should be, so we’re happy.” She repeats the same for Mackenzie, who gives an absent nod in response as she comes down from the last contraction. “Do whatever you need to, to be comfortable,” Katherine adds. “Take a shower as long as you need.” She looks to Will. “Did they let you know fluids only?”

“Yes,” he confirms.

“And they did a hep lock,” Katherines notes. “Just as a precaution.”

“Yeah, still an inconvenience,” Mackenzie gripes lightly.

“I know, I know,” Katherine gives her shoulder a little rub. “You hang in there. You’re doing amazing and you’re fit and you’re strong.” She nods encouragingly. Mackenzie murmurs a ‘thank you’. “I’ll check in with you again,” Dr Mottola says on her way out, giving Will’s arm a squeeze as she goes by.

“Do you want to take a shower?” Will asks, moving into Mackenzie’s line of sight so she doesn’t have to move to see him.

“I’m ok,” she says. “But I’m about to have another contraction.”

Will moves to her back. With her upright, he has to orient to find her pressure points again, and at the peak of it, she asks for a little more pressure. Dr Mottola is right though, she’s amazing.

 

 

**********

 

It’s four fifteen p.m.

Will hears their door open just as the next contraction starts and so he stands with his fingers in his wife’s back waiting for whoever’s come in to make themselves known. Another young woman comes in, wearing scrubs and a black fleece, trainers on her feet. “Hi guys,” she says brightly.

“Hi,” Will says.

“I’m Stacey, I’m one of the anaesthesiologist’s.”

Will almost cuts her off there.

“I was just wondering if I could have a quick chat?”

“Mackenzie doesn’t want an epidural,” Will says. From the bed, Mackenzie starts her mouth breathing, but seems blissfully unaware of this woman (she’s gone back to face down in the pillow). It feels strange to be speaking on her behalf, especially when she’s in the room, and especially because he’s speaking about her body, but Mackenzie’s okayed him several times to do exactly this. Still, it feels weird. What if she changes her mind and he’s chased Stacey from the hospital?

“That’s ok,” Stacey says, looking very unperturbed. “We can have a chat about the different options of pain relief.”

“Now’s not really a good time,” Will says pointedly, but he senses he’s not going to win this one without ruffling a lot of feathers either, and he doesn’t want to start a yelling match in one of the birthing suites at Weill-Cornell Presbyterian.

“Who are you talking to?” Mackenzie asks.

“Hi, I’m Stacey,” she introduces herself again. Mackenzie raises her head and Stacey does a spiel about the different types of pain relief the hospital offers, particularly the spinal epidural and Mackenzie half listens and nods away, and then politely says ‘no thanks’, she’s coping just fine and wants her natural birth. Stacey looks put out, but she puts on a brave face and thanks them for their time. It feels like a goddamn sales pitch, and Will figures it is. If they don’t use her services, she doesn’t get paid.

“Why didn’t you get rid of her?” Mackenzie huffs at Will.

“I tried,” he says, feeling slightly confronted.

“You’re supposed to take care of that for me.”

“I tried,” he says again, feeling guilty. He lowers his tone, lest he get terse. He physically backs off too, going to get his water bottle and taking a long draw of the water.

Mackenzie stands with her hands at her hips, staring at the floor. She looks swamped in the gown, except where her belly extends; the material is pulled tightly there. She looks really tired, and Will’s kind of amazed she’s still standing.

“How about the shower?” Will says.

She looks over at him and gives a wary nod. “Yes,” she breathes. “The shower.”


	33. Chapter 33

Will’s helping Mackenzie into the water when Casey comes to check on them. Mackenzie’s completely naked but doesn’t bat an eyelid as she lets the nurse take her blood pressure. Casey asks Will if he’s ok. She offers to bring him a coffee, which he gratefully accepts. There’s a chair in the shower, and at first Mackenzie tries sitting in it, the water at her shoulders, but it’s clear from the first contraction that it’s not helpful. Will shifts it so she can lean on the back of it, the shower spray, misting his shirt and jeans. The leaning helps, but Mackenzie wants to lean further and further forward until she just decides to kneel on the floor (there’s a mat for her knees), against the back of the chair. And that doesn’t quite do it for her either. She gets down on the floor on her hands and knees, the water pounding into the small of her back, and there she stays.

Casey comes back with a coffee for Will and he thanks her. He stands for a while, watching his wife, who rocks back and forth and side to side, but otherwise keeps her head down, almost pressed to the floor as well, as she works herself through the contractions. Will’s kind of glad for the break, and goes to the bag to eat a few more granola bars. There’s also dried fruit and potato chips; foods that were happy in storage for a few months until needed, that don’t require cooking, and that Will felt like he could stomach. He didn’t quite realise how hungry he’d feel. Maybe they thought this wouldn’t take as long as it is. They knew it would take a long time, but maybe didn’t quite think about how it would cut across regular meal times. Or afternoon nap times.

“Will?”

“Yeah,” he answers, moving immediately back to the bathroom.

Mackenzie is still head down in the shower; hasn’t moved as far as he can tell. “Can you re-tie my hair?”

“Yes,” he says, putting his coffee down on the seat of the shower chair. Mackenzie does not raise her head to help him out, so he has to half squat, half lean over her, carefully gathering up all the hair he can find, particularly from around her neck and forehead. He rebinds it in the hair band, tucking the ends under one of the loops of elastic so it doesn’t hang in her face or on her skin. He stands again.

“What’s that smell?” Mackenzie asks the shower floor.

Will looks around. There’s only him in here and he hasn’t done anything diff – oh. “It’s coffee.”

“Who’s got coffee?”

“I do.”

Mackenzie doesn’t answer him, and he feels guilty. He takes the coffee into the other room and has another large sip, then leaves it on the bench as Mackenzie calls for him again. “Yeah honey? I’m here.”

“Can you take my wedding rings off?”

“Yes,” he says and can see that they’re hanging in her face, with the angle she’s leaning. He squats next to her and looks along the chain to find the catch. It must be twisted around the other side, so he picks it up carefully and gently tugs the catch towards him. Mackenzie shifts from side to side as she must have a contraction and Will reaches out his hand to press his fingers into her spine, despite his arm getting saturated in a second.

“Lower,” Mackenzie moans and Will creeps his fingers down a few centimetres. “Lower,” Mackenzie requests again, and he does the same, finding his fingers in the top of her butt crack, his clothes getting wetter. Mackenzie gives another moan. And then she gags. Will can’t see ifs he’s been sick, and when the contraction ends, and he checks, he can see she hasn’t. She just seems to be dry heaving. Which is unpleasant, but better than bringing something up.

Will goes back to his mission to take her wedding rings off, getting a fingernail into the catch to release the chain, and taking them carefully from his wife, not wanting to disturb her. She’s gone still again. Will stands with the rings, his thighs on fire (telling himself to again, go to a god damn gym) and wonders what he’s going to do with her wedding rings. He doesn’t want to lose them. Maybe they should have left them at home, except, he feels weird about putting them somewhere that’s not near one of them. He stands for a moment and then goes to the mirror in the bathroom to put the rings around his neck. He tucks them under his shirt, notices how wet it is, and squeezes out some of the excess water into the sink. He can hear Mackenzie having another contraction, but she doesn’t talk to him, and he risks it to go change his shirt, using the other one to dry his arm, then laying it out to dry.

At quarter to five, Mackenzie says she wants to get out of the shower. Will finds towels and gets one of her nursing robes ready and helps her to dry off and dress, having to pause for contractions. She walks around the labour room a little, then leans against the end of the bed to work through a contraction (Will’s there, with his thumbs). When it’s over, she walks around a little more, seemingly lost in her own thoughts. Will tries his coffee again, but it’s rapidly getting cold. He does feel more alert and thinks maybe he should have packed caffeinated drinks for himself. He reminds Mackenzie to have a bit more water, and then wonders if she’s throwing that up. She takes one sip of the bottle before tossing it aside. Maybe she’s not even drinking enough for it to get to her stomach.

Casey comes in to check on them again (because it’s been half an hour) as Mackenzie leans against the bed for another contraction. Will moves to stick his fingers in his wife’s back, and answers for her that she’s doing ok. Casey asks if the contractions are still progressing and Will confesses he hasn’t particularly been timing them.

“That’s ok,” Casey gives him a warm smile. “Maybe do some timing for the next fifteen minutes? Just so we can make sure things are still progressing.”

“Sure,” Will nods and glances up at the clock.

It’s nearly five o’clock.

 

 

**********

 

Will manages to time for five minutes before Mackenzie decides she wants to get back into the shower. He has to switch to using his watch, as he helps her get under the water (a much easier and faster process than getting her out), and as far as he can tell, without clinical precision, the contracts are about two and a half minutes apart, and are nearly a minute long. Casey comes back fifteen minutes after she left and is surprised to see them back in the bathroom, Will sitting on a towel on the shower chair, Mackenzie at his feet, on her knees and elbows, her forehead almost to the shower floor. Will reports back his findings and she gives a positive smile and says ‘that’s great!’ before warning him that she needs to do another foetal check.

“Mackenzie,” Will starts to warn her that he’s going to have to get her out of the shower. “She can stay there,” Casey interrupts, so while she’s gone, Will warns Mackenzie instead that she’s going on the monitor for a moment, but that she can stay right where she is. Mackenzie nods. Casey brings the monitor back with her, a little green disc that she simply presses to the underside of Mackenzie’s belly and holds in place. The sound of the baby’s heartbeat fills the small tiled room, just as strong as it was nearly an hour ago, rising and falling with the contractions. Will can see the monitor but has no idea what he’s looking at. Casey reports everything looks good, and leaves them again.

At one point, Will asks Mackenzie if she needs him, and she bluntly says ‘no’, which leaves him to sit there, thinking. He wonders what Mackenzie’s thinking about, but then figures she’s probably just trying to rationalise how fucked up her body feels right now, and not freak out about it. He can’t even fathom it. Then he thinks about names for the baby, and can’t for the life of him even remember what was on the list in the hospital bag. He’d go to look, but he doesn’t want to leave Mackenzie’s side, just in case. He checks both their phones, but there are no messages. He thinks he hasn’t heard from Gideon for a while and wonders if that friendship has died. It was tentative to start, but they went for beers a few times and Will found the younger man interesting and genuine; he hoped he’d made a connection of some sort with someone other than his wife. Life’s busy. Who knows what’s happening? Gideon’s daughter must only be a few weeks old. A week old? Will isn’t really even sure what day it is (then has a total panic thinking he should have let Jim know he can’t go in to work, checks the date and realises it’s still only Sunday, and he’s totally fine).

Mostly, he thinks about his son. He tries to picture holding him, and being awake in the night to soothe him to sleep, and he wonders what he’ll be like as a toddler, or a teenager. He thinks about his father, who he knows attended Will’s birth (waited outside in the men’s waiting room), but not the others (Will’s not sure if it was because he couldn’t leave the farm, which seems like a logical answer. It definitely wasn’t to stay at home and take care of him and his siblings. They went to a neighbour), and he thinks about his mother and how she even coped with all of this. He wishes he’d asked more questions when she was alive, about what it was like for her, and whether she had pain relief (he’s actually not sure when the epidural was developed; Google says they started being developed in the early 1900s, but exploded in use for labour and delivery in the 1970s, which means it would not have been available to her). He has a lot of questions now, not just about giving birth, but what her marriage was like before his father started drinking heavily (Will knows enough to know it wasn’t all bad all the time), and what she did the first time he hit her, when that was, and whether she ever thought seriously about leaving him (he knows she threatened to, over, and over, and over again – he heard her sometimes).

For the first time in forever, he doesn’t think about how he’s going to cope if he’s depressed, because in all his visualisations, it doesn’t cross his mind. In fact, he hasn’t thought about it in what feels like so long, he’s not even sure he took his medication that morning (and being too scared of an overdose, doesn’t take it now either). He had a conversation with Habib about cutting down his therapy sessions, and he wonders if he can have a conversation with Habib about cutting down his medication too. Cutting it out altogether. Getting back to normal; a time when he wasn’t taking anti-depressants. Maybe, starting a new normal. A normal where he’s a father, and he’s not depressed.

Before Will really notices how long he’s been sitting there day dreaming, Casey’s back to check on them. It’s been half an hour. Will says they’re still doing ok. He asks her if he should have still been timing the contractions.

“No, it’s ok, you don’t have to time every one. You’ll know when she gets to transition.”

“Ok,” Will says.

“Have her waters broken yet?”

“I don’t know. She hasn’t said.”

“Ok,” Casey says. “That’s ok.” She stays while Mackenzie has a contraction and Will times with his watch how long it lasts. A minute. “Ok, that’s good,” Casey says positively. She hangs around and about a minute later, Mackenzie has another contraction. “So they’re definitely getting closer,” Casey notes.

“Yes,” Will says, feeling his heart beating intensely. God, they’re so close! _So_ close. Casey says she’ll check in a little later and leaves and Mackenzie raises her head and looks up at Will. She looks really wary, and pale; she doesn’t look great, to be honest. Will leans forward in his seat, reaches to give her neck a one handed massage. “You ok?” He asks.

“I want to get out,” Mackenzie says.


	34. Chapter 34

Mackenzie starts to stand and Will hurries to help her. He reaches to shut the water off and Mackenzie murmurs a ‘thank you’. She grips his left hand tightly and he gets his right hand under her arm to help lift her to her feet. He makes her stand there, where she is, and takes the towel he was sitting on to dry her off gently. Mackenzie leans on his shoulders while he crouches in front of her to dry her legs, and has a contraction. He rubs up and down her thighs, trying to relieve some of the tension, and as far as he can tell, nothing is leaking that suggests her waters have broken while she was in the shower. He berates himself a little for not leaving her nursing robe in the bathroom with them so he could put it on her right now. When the contraction ends, he dumps the towel on the floor and makes her step onto it to dry the bottom of her feet, but holds onto her arms and walks slowly backwards into the birthing room to the bed. Mackenzie has another massive contraction, that actually has her crying out in pain, and Will feels a hot flush rush through his body. Guilt, for not moving fast enough, because now she’s not in a good position to get through the contraction. Panic, that this one seems to be a monster, and he’s not in a good position to help her. And surprise. Didn’t she just have one?

For a second, he stands there, her fingers bunched in the shoulder of his shirt, his hands kind of hovering near her hips, like he’s going to catch her if she falls, and then remembers himself, and reaches for the small of her back. He massages but that doesn’t stop the agony on his wife’s face and so he measures out where the dimples in her back should be and sticks his thumbs into them. “More,” Mackenzie immediately whimpers, so Will tries but the angle’s not great and he can’t reach as well as he’d like. He feels Mackenzie’s knees dip and he really is scared that she might fall, but she holds, dropping her head forward against his chest, so that she can lean over a little, which ruins his reach on her back further, and then requests ‘more’ of him. He tries, he really tries, but he feels frozen to the spot and unsure; should he insist she move, or ride it out the best he can?

When the contraction finally fades away he quickly gets the gown on her and starts to move her closer to the bed, so she can lean on it, because that seems to be the best position for her (and it is for him too). Mackenzie suddenly looks up at him and stops walking. “Oh,” she says, sounding surprised. “My waters just broke.”

Will looks down at the puddle forming at her feet. “Ok,” he says, but he feels his heart rate go up, and keeps walking her forward towards the side of the bed, where the pillow is. He reaches for his cell phone to get Casey to come in, but stays with his wife, rubbing her lower back, and then up and down her back in long strokes, and along her shoulders. “You ok?” He asks her.

“It feels close,” Mackenzie says and Will’s not entirely sure what she means. The baby? The baby’s close? She still has to get through transition, and then all the pushing; this could still be several hours. He’s trying to think of something positive to say when Casey answers her phone.

“Mackenzie’s water’s broke,” Will says.

“Ok, great!” Casey says brightly. “I’ll be right in.” When she does, she moves to a cupboard across the room straight away. “Let me put something under you,” she takes down a little package, and then unfolds it to make a big meter squared absorbent mat, which she puts over the first puddle. She gets another one for the puddle currently forming at Mackenzie’s feet, and Will helps steady her as she lifts one leg at a time so Casey can put the second absorbent mat under her. Casey mops up the puddle of amniotic fluid and asks if they need anything else. Mackenzie shakes her head vigorously, already starting another contraction, while Will thanks the nurse, and she leaves, saying she’ll let Katherine know. He moves to his wife’s back and presses his fingers into her pressure points. She lifts her head and grips the bedsheet tightly, bunching it into white fists. Will presses harder, his knuckles starting to give out under the pressure.

It’s a long freaking minute and Mackenzie swears at the ceiling once, while Will tries to press harder and harder at her back. “Keep breathing!” He blurts, trying to remember all the things that might help his wife get through this, and Mackenzie sucks in a short breath before letting it out in a huff. She gives a whimper and seems to give up when the contraction ends, slumping forward to the bed, leaning on her hands, head down. “I don’t think I can do this!” She wails.

Will abandons her back quickly and rubs his hand over her shoulders, leaning down closer to her head. “Yes you can. You can do this. You’re already doing this,” he says. Mackenzie sobs and he can feel her shaking. “You’re the strongest person I know Mackenzie. You can do this,” he repeats. And repeats. He keeps telling her she’s amazing and he’s proud of her and she can more than do this. “I know it seems like a long day, but you’ve gotten this far,” he reminds her. “You can do this. It won’t be much longer.” He pauses but Mackenzie’s got her head down. She’s not sobbing anymore, but that doesn’t mean she’s not crying. “Do you want to get back in the shower?” He tries.

“No,” Mackenzie moans. “I need you.”

“Ok, I’m right here,” he says quickly. “I’m right here,” he says again, rubbing his hand back and forth over her shoulders, and up and down her spine.

“Will,” Mackenzie groans, her voice breaking as she gears up for another contraction. He moves back to her back, and tries his thumbs this time, leaving Mackenzie leaning over the bed. She cusses again and Will presses harder at her back, better able to lock his thumb joints than his fingers, though he has to forego the tips of the digits for the pads to be able to do so. He’s suddenly aware of Katherine at his side and she gives him a sympathetic expression as Mackenzie breathes heavily through the contraction. He tries to pay attention to the doctor, to see what she wants, but she waves him off, indicating she’ll wait. Mackenzie gives another high-pitched distressed noise and Will presses harder, his thumbs aching with it. The joints are stretched out closer up, near his hand, and he regrets this positioning. He’s not sure _he_ can do this. He suddenly remembers his wooden spoons. “Can you do me a favour?” He asks Mackenzie’s OB/GYN.

“Sure,” she says warmly.

“In the bag,” he jerks his chin to indicate it on the bench over there. “There’s some wooden spoons in the side.”

“You want them?” Katherine asks, walking over to the bag, her heels clipping on the linoleum floor.

“Yes please,” Will says, lifting on his toes slightly to try and get more pressure on his wife’s back. Katherine pulls open the sides of the bag to peer in and then rummages and produces the wooden spoons.

“More,” Mackenzie requests from the bed and Will tries to push harder.

Katherine comes back with the spoons but Will waits on the contraction before taking them; he doesn’t want to dare let go. As it eases off, Will switches to rubbing Mackenzie’s back. “Katherine’s here,” he says gently. Mackenzie gives an ‘mmmm’ of acknowledgement. Will takes the wooden spoons and thanks her.

“What are you going to do with those?” Dr Mottola asks.

Will simulates jamming them in his wife’s back – he hasn’t actually run this by Mackenzie, and he thinks now might not be the right time to clue her in. Katherine gives an ‘ah’ expression. “I just came in to see how you’re doing,” she says to Mackenzie, moving closer to her, who has her head up now, alert to what the doctor wants. “Casey said your waters broke, so that’s great! And everything looks great, so we’re happy.”

Will notes that everything is ‘great’ and positive, and there’s always warm smiles and happy expressions. What she means by ‘everything looks great’ is that the amniotic fluid is not discoloured, which would indicate something’s wrong. Mackenzie gives a nod, and says ‘ok’. Katherine reminds her the amniotic fluid might keep leaking out for a while, which is totally normal, and Mackenzie nods again. “If you need anything, you let me know,” Katherine reiterates, _again._ And then moves away as another contraction starts to build. Will thinks they’ve got to be less than a minute apart now, and looks up at the clock. He puts the ends of the wooden spoons in his wife’s back and presses. Mackenzie requests ‘more’ so he presses harder and he notices her breathing settles into a nice steady pattern (heavy though, in through her nose, out through her mouth) and she pops her head down against the bed.

“Now, I’ve seen everything,” Katherine says, giving Will a smile, before heading to the door.

 

 

**********

 

Mackenzie is simulating a sex act on him.

Sort of. He’s standing behind her, wooden spoons in her back (they’re perfect. Best advice he’s had. The curved end fits perfectly in his palm and he can push as hard as Mackenzie needs him to without stressing out his body in any way), and she’s rocking back and forth on her wrists, leaning on the edge of the bed, head down towards the mattress, so that she moves closer and further from him; her ass almost pressing against his groin in a rhythmic motion.

Casey comes in to check on them, and change the absorbent mat underneath Mackenzie, with Will’s help (he helps to steady his wife as she lifts each leg). She’s floored by his wooden spoon trick. But he swears that it’s working, because Mackenzie’s gotten quiet again. She’s in her head, working her way through the contractions, instead of cussing at the ceiling or huffing her breaths (she sticks with the heavy and steady, in through the nose, and out through the mouth) so the pain relief must be working. He basically keeps the pressure on all the time now, just making it stronger as the contractions peak, and easing off in the brief dip between them. Will’s been keeping an eye on the clock, and the contractions have moved so close together, they’re fluctuating between thirty seconds and fifteen seconds apart (he’s not really keeping a very close eye on the clock). But more importantly, they’re over a minute long.

“I reckon she’s close,” Casey says knowledgeably.

“Do you think she’s in transition?” Will asks hopefully. It’s nearing six o’clock. They’ve been at the hospital for _hours_. He’s been awake for twelve, which means Mackenzie’s officially been in labour for more than twelve, which doesn’t even take into consideration the contracting that went on on Saturday.

“I’d say she’s been in transition since her waters broke,” Casey says.

“Oh,” Will says, surprised he didn’t put that together.

“I could get Katherine to come check her?”

“Uhm,” Will thinks. He doesn’t want to bring his wife out of her zone, but he also figures there’s no point in letting her labour on if she doesn’t need to. “She’ll want to push though, if she’s fully dilated?”

“She might start to feel an urge to push during the contractions,” Casey answers. “But she won’t be ready to until she’s likely to feel the urge to push on every contraction and in between them. So even if she’s in transition now, it’s not time to start birthing.”

“Then let’s leave it,” Will says. He doesn’t want to bother her out of her focus just to satisfy his curiosity (and impatience).

“Hang in there,” Casey gives him an optimistic smile and wanders off again.

Will wonders when her shift ends. He wonders how he missed the part where Mackenzie was in transition. He feels a need to check his notes, but this isn’t an exam, and who really cares? In the end, it only matters if Mackenzie is fully dilated or not, because she can’t push before then, and he doesn’t want to suggest Katherine comes in to check her every five minutes just because he’s getting antsy. Mackenzie will let him know when things are changing for her. Every woman experiences labour differently, so it doesn’t matter if Mackenzie’s contractions don’t follow some sort of internet schedule.

If she’s happy, he’s happy.

As happy as she’s going to be right now.


	35. Chapter 35

“Will,” Mackenzie groans from the bed and he snaps out of his daydream. Before he can think to press his wooden spoons into her back more firmly, she tells him she needs the bathroom.

“Ok,” he says, and steps back, noticing that now that he’s moving, his legs ache from standing, his feet are sore, and his back hurts. Still, he can hardly complain when his wife is in labour. Even his arms feel stiff from holding the same position too long and he shakes them out to get the blood flowing, as he puts his tools on the end of the bed and turns to his wife. She hasn’t moved. She’s still got her face pressed against the pillow as she leans over the bed. He rubs his palm over the back of her shoulders and she gives a sigh. “Come on,” he cajoles and lifts her by the elbow gently, encouraging her to get up and get moving.

Once she starts though, she moves surprisingly quickly, almost running to the toilet, and Will takes a moment to catch up. Then, he decides that maybe he shouldn’t. Maybe a little privacy is in order. He goes to the bag to have a few more snacks and spots his cold coffee still sitting on the bench. He’s tempted, but actually, he hasn’t been to the bathroom all day and he kind of needs to go himself. He’ll go after Mackenzie’s done. He rubs his eyes as he chews the last granola bar from that box, and checks the time. It’s nearly quarter past six. Casey will be coming in soon to do her monitoring of Mackenzie and the baby, and to check that everything else is ok. Will sits on the end of the bed while he waits, having to belatedly dig wooden spoons out of his ass when he forgets they’re there amongst the sheet. He checks their phones, but there are no messages. He closes his eyes a moment, feeling tired and wary, and slightly wired with knowing that they’re _so_ close to meeting their son.

Then he realises Mackenzie’s been gone a while and he goes to the open bathroom door and taps on it, before stepping into the frame, to see if she’s ok. Mackenzie is on the toilet, her robe open around the bump of the baby. She’s leaning forward, her head down, and she’s just sitting there, her eyes closed, a frown between her eyebrows. Will comes further into the room. “Honey?” He calls to her. “You ok?”

Mackenzie shakes her head.

“Did you go?” Will asks, hesitating by the doorway.

Mackenzie shakes her head again. She doesn’t look comfortable.

Will gets closer. “Nothing happened?”

She shakes her head.

“Rectal pressure?” He guesses. There’s a question he’d never thought he’d be asking his wife.

Mackenzie nods vigorously as her face turns to a strained expression and she rocks back slightly where she’s sitting, a contraction clearly starting. She gags, but doesn’t open her mouth, and nothing comes up. Will feels heat flood down his back, guilty that he’s left her here too long while she’s still contracting. He sits on the tiles and picks up her left foot, lifting it so he can see, and presses the tip of his finger into the soft part of her foot, right beneath the pad. Mackenzie pants and he takes her other foot and finds the same spot, though a little awkwardly, because she doesn’t help him with taking the weight of her leg. As soon as he does it, she relaxes a little; it’s the combination of raising her legs slightly, and the pressure points in her feet. He reminds her to breath, guiding her breaths when she threatens to hyperventilate, in and out, in and out, nice and steady. It works to calm her, but her face remains red and Will can see she’s sweating. Her skin feels clammy and she rocks back and forth a little as she works through the contraction, internalising again, her eyes tightly shut and her face pale.

The contraction seems to go for a long time and she gives an unhappy whimper. Will can’t check is watch to see the time exactly, but he suspects Casey is right, and this is transition, and he’s glad, because they’re crossing the final hurdle of the first stage of labour; Mackenzie’s cervix will dilate the final centimetres to ten, and then she can start stage two: pushing.

“You can do this,” Will murmurs, watching her face carefully; finally, they’re face to face. “I’m so proud of you,” he goes on. This is the worst bit and she’s gotten to it without any pain medication whatsoever. Exactly what she wanted. “You’re so strong.” He feels a little choked up. He clears his throat quietly. “I love you.”

“Will?” Mackenzie says tightly.

“Yeah?”

“Shut up.”

 

 

**********

 

Casey finds them still in the toilet five minutes later. From the doorway, she asks if everything’s ok. Will says it is. He explains Mackenzie’s feeling the rectal pressure and Casey nods genially, like it’s something she hears everyday (and it probably is). She does warn him that she needs to check the baby and Will asks if she can do that from the toilet. Casey says ‘of course’ and goes to get her monitor. Mackenzie’s still rocking back and forth, and she’s still sweating. In fact, nothing has changed. Will still has his fingers in her feet, her heels are digging into his crossed legs, and he’s staring at her face, while it seems like the contractions hit non-stop. No wonder they say this is the worst bit.

One thing has changed though: he needs to pee badly now. And Mackenzie’s on the toilet. Plus, he doesn’t want to leave her now. He should have gone ages ago. For all his planning, there are some things he has just not been prepared for.

Casey comes back in with her trolley of electrical equipment, and the green disc and Will warns Mackenzie of what’s about to happen. “Hurry up,” she gripes and Will looks to Casey, who seems completely unbothered by the snapped instruction. She does have to ask Mackenzie to sit back a little to get the monitor in the right place, but Mackenzie complies and Casey crouches next to where Will’s sitting, and the sound of his son’s heartbeat fills the room, rapid and pulsing. They talk about the new pressure points Will’s using. Will mentions Mackenzie’s hot and Casey says she’ll get some cold compresses and water for them. She notices his leg jigging and asks if he’s ok.

“I need the bathroom myself,” he confesses.

“There’s another one down the corridor, to the left, you’ll see the signs.”

“Thank you,” Will says, but he doesn’t move.

“I’ll stay with her,” Casey offers.

Will still hesitates.

“Let me finish this and I’ll do the pressure points,” she offers.

“Thank you,” Will says.

Casey checks the monitors and says everything looks ok.

‘ _Ok but not great?_ ’ Will thinks, but he shifts to the side to let Casey get in next to him and shows her the place on Mackenzie’s foot where she needs to press. Will tells Mackenzie what’s happening and she gives a ‘hm’ in response, eyes still closed. He swaps places with the nurse and hurries from the room. He goes out into the corridor and goes left, strides down to the bathrooms and uses the urinal. He washes his hands quickly. On his way back, he sees an overhead sign that says ‘refreshment station’ and goes pass their birthing suite to get a cup of ice chips. And then he hurries back and finds his wife in the same spot, Casey still on the floor, having a conversation about rectal pressure and poop. He tries not to care that Mackenzie hasn’t told the nurse to shut up.

Casey gives him a bright smile as he comes back in. “What have you got there?”

“Ice chips,” Will says.

Casey gets up, leaving Mackenzie’s feet unattended (to Will’s slight annoyance, especially when Mackenzie recoils), and says she’ll get him those compresses. Will sits quickly, placing the ice next to him and takes up Mackenzie’s feet himself. He can’t tell if Mackenzie is mid-contraction, or between them, but she whimpers a little until he’s back in position, and he can feel her pushing her heels down into his leg. Casey comes in with one of the plastic barf buckets and pops it on the floor next to the ice chips; it’s half full with water. She places a few cloths on Will’s knee.

“Oh, let’s get this out of here,” she says to herself (Will thinks), and wheels her foetal monitoring equipment out of the small room. She comes back with a dry towel, and moves the shower seat closer. “Do you want to sit?”

“I’m ok here,” Will says, because this is going to be a better angle for Mackenzie. Casey leaves it near him anyway and moves the water, ice chips, towel and cloths to it. Will thanks her. Casey asks him if he needs anything; he says he’s fine. Now that he’s peed, he feels much better. And the rushing around has got his heart pumping and he feels alert and determined again.

“The call button is there if you need something,” Casey points to it, on the wall next to where Mackenzie’s sitting, even though Will has her cell number for direct dial. “I’ll let Katherine know things are moving forward. She might come and talk to you.”

“Ok,” Will says with a nod, watching his wife’s face and the way it relaxes slightly as he presses more firmly. She’s right. Katherine does come to talk to them. She asks Mackenzie about what she’s experiencing but is inclined to agree with Will. She doesn’t want to move Mackenzie to check dilation if she’s comfortable there, and isn’t experiencing the urge to push. She leaves them where they are, telling Will the baby will be here soon. She seems excited, or at least, upbeat, but Will’s feeling wary in the face of optimism at this point. Someone mentioned ‘soon’ an hour ago. They could still sit here for another hour before Mackenzie can start pushing.

Will watches his wife’s face and notices the crease between her eyebrows has evened out. He tentatively lets one of her feet go, so he can reach for a cloth. He dips it into the cool water, and lets her other foot go to wring the cloth out. He folds it and reaches up to Mackenzie and then stops. “Honey, I’ve got a cool cloth for you.”

“Mm,” Mackenzie says, eyes still closed, but she moves forward a little closer.   
Will reaches to wipe her face and notices the drop of her shoulders. He also notices the moment it all changes again, as another contraction clearly starts. He ditches the cloth in the puke bucket and presses his fingers in the bottoms of her feet again. Mackenzie rocks back and forth slightly, but her breath stays relatively even, even as she switches to the heavy breaths, in through the nose, and out through the mouth.

Will sits that way for a long time, pressing her feet, watching her face for the cues that tell him a contraction is ending, so he can wipe her face and neck, arms and hands, legs and feet. She murmurs a ‘thank you’ to him and he takes heart that he’s back to getting it right. Her face stays flushed though and Will’s back starts to ache from reaching. He offers her an ice chip, which she accepts, and then asks for more of. He has one himself.

It’s six seventeen p.m.


	36. Chapter 36

It is at this point, and only this point, that Will wishes there were someone else there with them. He can’t press this fingers into her feet and change out the cold compresses on her neck, and feed her ice chips to try and wet her mouth, with contractions almost continuous. Given the clear discomfort and pain Mackenzie is in, Will feels overwhelmed and useless. He thinks she’s crying, given the way she kind of sobs, but she’s not producing tears and he feels awful for her. He feels awful for himself too, for just sitting there and not being able to do much. That epidural’s looking good about now. But it’s too late.

(And Mackenzie made him swear he would not try to tempt her with pain relief.)

Casey comes to check on them every five minutes. Or so it feels to Will. He has no idea what time it is or how long he’s been sitting there. He’s vaguely aware that his ass is cold and numb and his back aches. He’s tired, and stressed and he can’t imagine what Mackenzie’s feeling. It feels like Casey is not gone long before she’s back. Sometimes, she just comes to watch from the doorway, and Will is aware of her in his periphery, sometimes she asks how things are and if Mackenzie’s feeling the urge to push. Will doesn’t ask his wife, because he doesn’t want to disturb her focus, and if she doesn’t say, he figures she isn’t. He knows transition can take some time, even though he wishes the fucker would hurry the fuck up.

At six thirty two p.m. Mackenzie murmurs that she wants to push. Will’s surprised that she spoke, given they’ve been sitting there in silence for a while and it takes him a moment to realise that she is pushing and for his brain to click. “Don’t,” he says. “Don’t push honey. It’s too soon.”

He thinks.

Mackenzie makes an unhappy noise and Will reaches for his blackberry to call to get Casey back here. “Just wait,” Will tries to encourage his wife and then when it seems like she’s ignoring him, he tilts her chin up so her face is more towards the ceiling and tells her to blow the air out of her lungs like she’s blowing up a balloon. He lets go of her other foot to wipe her face quickly and her face morphs to agony.

Casey answers. “She wants to push,” Will informs her.

“Tell her not to and I’ll be right there,” Casey says. When she comes in she tells Mackenzie not to push herself. “We need to check you first. Is she feeling the urge continuously?”

“I don’t know,” Will answers. He gives one of Mackenzie’s knees a slight shake to get her attention. “Honey, are you feeling the urge to push all the time?”

Mackenzie shakes her head, still puffing air at the ceiling, eyes still closed, face red, rocking back and forth slightly. “Just…”

“Just on the contractions?” Will finishes.

“Yes,” Mackenzie grits out, nodding. She gags a little, awkward with her throat stretched, making her whole body twitch.

“Is she going to be sick?” Casey asks.

“No, it’s just dry heaves,” Will answers. “She’s been doing it all day.” He can’t tell if the contractions are ending anymore, and he wonders then if Mackenzie does feel the urge to push continuously. Casey stays and puts a fresh compress against Mackenzie’s neck. Will tries harder to put pressure in Mackenzie’s feet. She keeps rocking back and forth, and she keeps puffing air out at the ceiling, but Will notices a slight change in the urgency in which she does it, and that’s how he can tell the contractions are ending. They’re long, well over a minute now, and the reprieve in between is short, but there are subtle changes.

“I can’t go,” Mackenzie says. Will doesn’t know what that means, so he tells her it will be soon. Just hold on, it will be soon. He feels a sudden prickle of tears in his eyes for her and what she’s going through and if he didn’t already think she was magnificent, he does now. The prickle of waterworks becomes an overwhelming urge to burst into tears. He sucks it up.

With time still distorted, Will’s not sure how long this fresh hell lasts, but Casey stays, wiping Mackenzie’s face and changing the compresses. She even gets Mackenzie to sip some of the icy water from the melting ice chips and Will’s really grateful, because he kept thinking ‘I’ve left her water on the bed’ and he can see her lips are so dry.

“How are you doing Mackenzie?” Casey asks her, after five minutes (only five minutes, but to Will, it feels like a really fucking long time).

Mackenzie gives a moan in response.

“Are you wanting to push a lot more now?” The nurse asks carefully.

“Yes,” Mackenzie says and Will feels his heart soar.

“Let’s get her to the bed. I’ll get Katherine to come in and check her,” Casey says to Will. She goes into the birthing suite and Will can hear her talking to someone (on the phone). He focuses on his wife. He lets her feet go and stands, his body stiff and sore. Mackenzie gives a sob-like noise of distress from the toilet. Will puts his hand on her shoulder to get her attention. “Honey, let’s go into the other room.”

“I’m ok,” she says.

“Katherine’s going to come and check how dilated you are,” Will says.

“Mm,” Mackenzie says.

“We think you’re close to pushing,” he tries, hoping he’s not giving her false hope, but motivation.

Mackenzie opens her eyes and takes a second longer to look up at him. She looks dazed, but she blinks at him and gives a nod. She unfurls the fists she’s been squeezing since they got to the bathroom and reaches up to give them to Will. He notices how they tremor slightly, grips them carefully, and braces his weight to pull her to a stand. He makes sure she’s steady on her feet before slowly backing out of the bathroom and returning to the birthing suite. There are more people in there now, all women (Will’s not sure who they are, or what their roles are), and Katherine has arrived, in scrubs this time, trainers on her feet, her hair pulled back into a high pony. She gives Will a pleasant smile; Mackenzie has her head down, looking at her feet.

The atmosphere of the room feels different, and the extra people have changed things up. Different lights are on, the absorbent mat on the floor has been cleared away. The things that were on the bed have been moved to the side; the sheet has been stripped to leave the fitted one only. The curtain has been pulled over the door. Will keeps backing up until he’s at the bed, which has been lowered significantly. “On the bed?” He asks Katherine and she nods. She starts putting on gloves and Will can’t help but feel, even before they check how dilated Mackenzie’s cervix is, that this is it. Nervousness settles in his stomach. It may also be because he doesn’t want to hear that Mackenzie is anything but ready to start actually giving birth.

“Is everyone waiting for me?” Mackenzie asks.

“Everyone’s here for you,” Will says.

“Take your time, honey,” Katherine says. “We’ve got all the time for you and baby. No rush.”

Will helps Mackenzie on to the bed, getting her to sit and then physically lifting her legs for her, swinging her up to the mattress. Katherine takes over explaining what’s happening and Mackenzie nods. The colour in her face as returned closer to normal and she seems to be breathing normally. Will stands by, and she grips his right index finger as Katherine gently pries her legs apart to insert two fingers into her vagina. Will feels himself wince and focuses on his wife’s face. She’s put her head back against the pillow and holds his finger tightly, her eyes closed. She seems almost at peace.

“Mackenzie, are you still feeling the urge to push?” Katherine asks.

“Mm,” Mackenzie nods, head still back, eyes still closed.

“She’s so close,” Katherine says to a colleague and Will feels horrified for a moment; all of this for nothing? And then Katherine tells Mackenzie it’s time for her to start pushing, and Will thinks ‘what?!’ “A little gentle pushing might just finish the dilation,” Katherine explains to Will, who’s on the verge of protesting (if Mackenzie pushes before her cervix is dilated, she can tear it, and Will’s not sure what that would entail exactly, but it sounds bad. Bad enough for him to protest on his wife’s behalf). They’re the professionals though. He’ll trust them. Actually, he trusts Katherine, and at first, it was just because Mackenzie did, but he now, he likes her of his own accord. She’s been great. So has Casey.

Will turns to Mackenzie and repeats what Katherine said (and feels a little excited!) and Mackenzie opens her eyes and looks up at him. “Now?” She asks.

“When you’re ready,” Katherine says changing out her gloves.

Mackenzie gives a little nod and moves to sit up further. “Do you want to move?” Will asks, which seems like an obvious question when Mackenzie’s trying to shift anyway. But he means, to a different position entirely.

“Yes,” she nods. She lets go of his hand and sits up, and then awkwardly shifts her hips so she can get her legs under her better, so she can lean forward, onto her hands and knees. Will stands by.

“When you feel the next contraction starting,” Katherine instructs, by the bed, next to Will. “I want you start with some gentle pushing.”

Mackenzie nods. Will feels his heart pounding.

“That’s actually perfect,” Katherine looks over Mackenzie to her colleague (hands and knees isn’t a gravity assisted delivery position, so won’t be too intense on Mackenzie’s cervix), who Will doesn’t know. Perhaps now isn’t the right time for introductions.

“I can feel it starting,” Mackenzie says.

“Ok, just gentle pushes for me,” Katherine says, her tone taking on an excited edge.

Will can feel his heart throbbing out of his chest.

Mackenzie drops her head down and Will can hear her holding her breath as she bears down.

“Great work!” Katherine encourages. “That’s great. I’m just going to check you again, ok?” Mackenzie starts to sit back but Katherine stays her with a hand on her back. She checks Mackenzie again and gives nods all around the room. “Ok, Mackenzie. When you feel the next contraction, push as hard as you can, for as long as you can.”

Mackenzie nods.

Will feels his mouth go dry.

Mackenzie rocks forward so her weight’s more on her hands again.

Will holds his breath.

And then Mackenzie starts pushing.

Will glances up at the clock.

It’s six forty six p.m.


	37. Chapter 37

Ok, it’s not funny or anything, but full disclosure, when Will watched a birthing video for the first time at the childbirth classes, he wanted to laugh. Not because anything particularly hilarious happened, but because the noises the poor woman was making were kind of affronting, and he was part startled by them, and part embarrassed at witnessing the baby coming out of her body; he didn’t really know how to react (but figured laughing out loud was going to be a bad, bad move). He watched another birth with Mackenzie, on youtube (yeah, they’re on youtube, and they’re graphic; honestly, the things people upload…), of a woman specifically having a natural birth, and he found it way less funny the second time around (although certainly uncomfortable when the baby’s head was out and just sitting there). And now, with his own wife, it’s so far removed from wanting to make him laugh, he actually feels closer to wanting to cry. It’s more the nauseating mix of tension and pride, and anticipation and helplessness, than any kind of emotional response, but that’s there too, in the eagerness for this whole process to end.

It’s been the world’s longest day and Mackenzie must be exhausted.

He has no idea how she’s gotten through this.

He thought the whole first stage of labour was a long and intense progress, and yet as they got through each stage, from early, to active, it got more intense and even longer. As the contractions got stronger and closer together, he thought it was demanding, then they hit transition, and he thought that was way more intense and all consuming, but it’s nothing compared to stage two of labour, the bit where Mackenzie attempts to squeeze a person out of her body. She’s on her hands and knees on the bed, her bare ass up in the air, and a big spot light shining up it (the invasiveness of having a baby!). Will stands at the other end of the bed. It has no lip on it, so he’s able to get really close to Mackenzie, though he doesn’t touch her (he has put a cold compress on her neck, which she thanked him for). She has her head down, almost to the mattress, and she’s panting.

“Nice deep breaths,” Katherine reminds her gently from the head of the bed, where she stands watching (?) with her colleague (who Will still doesn’t know, and doesn’t know what they do). “Breathing for you and baby.”

Mackenzie immediately responds to the instruction. She’s been pushing for, Will doesn’t know how long (it’s ten minutes), but it feels like ages. And he gets that it’s going to take time, he was listening to the woman who took their birthing class, and he paid attention during the videos he saw, but he still can’t quite comprehend that it takes so long! He’s got the stress sweats and his stomach churns. The room is very quiet, just the sounds of Mackenzie working her way up to push on the next contraction, and the strained noise in her throat (that’s not at all amusing) as she bears down. For a long time. She pushes and pushes for the full length of the contraction and then when it ends, she pants again, until Katherine reminds her she’s still breathing for herself _and_ the baby; nice deep breaths.   

Will rinses the cold compress in his barf bucket of cold water and puts it over Mackenzie’s neck again. She gives a sob. “I don’t think I can do this.”

Will happens to look at Katherine as Mackenzie speaks and the doctor looks at him, as do the other women in the room; ‘it’s on you buddy’. He leans down to his wife, who still has her head down. “Yes you can,” he says, aware that she told him to shut up not so long ago when he was trying to be encouraging. “You’re already doing it. It’s nearly over.”

“The baby’s close Mackenzie,” Katherine says.

“Can you see him?” Mackenzie asks.

Will looks over at Katherine and she gives an encouraging nod. “Yes,” Will says. “He’s right there.”

“You can see him?” Mackenzie asks again, her tone hopeful, and the inflection on ‘you’.

Will goes around the bed and has a look and yes, he can see his son’s head crowning (dark hair). It’s gross, honestly, it’s gross, but it’s also kind of wondrous, and nothing else needs to be said. His son is right there. He goes back to Mackenzie and leans in close to her ear. “I can see him Mackenzie. He’s _right_ there,” he says, and tears well up in his eyes. “You can do this,” he says, his tone low, an almost murmur, right in her ear, just for her. “Do it for me,” he says, using words she’s used on him that honestly inspired him and grounded him and encouraged him.

Casey warns Mackenzie that she’s going to massage her perineum and Mackenzie nods,

raising her head slightly to acknowledge what’s happening (honestly, the things women go through to have babies) and pushes down hard on the next contraction, her fingers fisting in the sheet beneath her, while Katherine encourages her at the other end of the bed, about her strength and how well she’s doing. Casey checks in periodically with the foetal monitor and the baby’s heart beat is strong in the room. “He’s working with you,” Will murmurs to his wife. “Do it for him,” he urges. “Do it together.” And Mackenzie pushes until she cries out.

“He’s going back in!” She wails.

“He’s not,” Katherine quickly answers. “It just feels that way. He’s really close. You’re doing really well.”

“He’s really close,” Will repeats. “You can do it.”

Christ, he feels like throwing up. He can’t imagine what Mackenzie’s feeling. His worst dump isn’t going to ever compare to this. He’s not going to be able to look at her vagina in the same way ever again. He’s not going to be able to look at Mackenzie the same way ever again. Or any other woman who’s given birth. Or maybe just even women in general. With everything they go through. Particularly being pregnant and giving birth. He feels a fresh wave of loathing for his father, hitting his mother, and shuts it down, focusing on the room, on this moment, on breathing. He matches Mackenzie breath for breath, and notices he’s holding his when she’s pushing (no wonder he feels ill). He can feel his heart pounding in his throat.

Mackenzie keeps pushing, and Will feels like bouncing on his toes. He’s amped up. He’s already seen his son’s head. Dark hair, like his mother, and Will’s suddenly excited for Mackenzie to see him too. Katherine asks if she wants to touch the baby’s head and Mackenzie utters a blunt ‘no’ before getting on with the pushing. Will remembers to change the cold compress at Mackenzie’s neck, wiping the sweat from her face with the freshly chilled rag, before rinsing it again and putting it across the back of her neck once more. The hair around her face and neck is damp, and her skin hot where Will touches it with his bare hands.

Mackenzie pushes on another contraction and half way through Katherine stops her. “Just wait one moment Mackenzie, the baby’s head is out.”

It doesn’t take much for Will to step back and have a look, and he’s greeted by the screwed up face of his son. For a second, he’s struck with a weird idea that the baby looks like Mackenzie. And then he’s struck with how much it looks like some fucked up animatronics from the eighties, that creepy alien thing from the original _Total Recall_ movie, or some horror from David Bowie’s _Labyrinth_. (He’ll completely forgo how fucked up it looks for his wife to have a baby’s head hanging out of her ass.)

Will steps back to Mackenzie and she looks over at him. “Is he ok?” She asks, her deep brown eyes filled with worry and Will gives her a proud smile he can’t quite help. “He’s just fine,” he says, not entirely sure if that’s true or not, but feeling like it is. He puts a hand to her shoulder and gives it a squeeze, feeling the way she tremors slightly. “You’re doing the best job.”

“Ok, Mackenzie,” Katherine speaks up, having finished whatever she was doing. “You can go ahead and keep pushing now.”

Mackenzie takes a deep breath and bears down again and Will finds himself moving to watch as his son’s body turns slowly, without the help of anyone else, until a shoulder slides free, and then turns back the other way and Katherine reaches out with gloved hands to gently take hold of him as she encourages Mackenzie to go ahead and push him all the way out. That’s it. He just slides free. His son is born and he’s a father and Mackenzie is a mother.

The baby is blue, at first, but rapidly turns pink as he starts breathing. Katherine puts him down on the bed behind his mother, into a waiting blanket, and the medical staff move in to clear his air way with a big blobby suctioner (they stick it up each nostril, and in his mouth) and he starts making noises of protest; not crying, but almost mewling, an almost panicked ‘I don’t know what’s happening’ response. Mackenzie asks Will if he’s ok and Will says that he is (he knows she means the baby, not him). He’s a goddamn mess, covered in the white vernix, and other stuff that just looks messy and disgusting, but he’s moving and breathing and he’s here. The umbilical cord is clamped off in two places, one close to his body, and one several inches further away, and Katherine asks Will if he wants to cut the cord. He steps up to do it, cutting through the spongy tubing with surgical scissors (it’s not as easy as he thought it was going to be), between the two clamps. While he does that, someone else puts a tag on the baby’s ankle, and someone else starts wiping him down, and another one of those someone else’s has a conversation with Katherine about the bleeding, while she picks the baby up and gives Will a nod. He goes to his wife, who is twisting to see the baby herself and helps her to sit back against the head of the bed (onto a wad of cloths and blankets). Katherine puts the baby against her chest for skin to skin care. The other nurses come in with blankets, covering Mackenzie and the baby and wiping him. He starts really crying, and he’s loud!

“Congratulations!” Katherine says.

Will hovers for a second, while the nurses are in there, then moves around them to stand right at the head of the bed, even out of Mackenzie’s eyesight. He can look down on his son, who’s pink now, mouth wide open in a squall. His head is squished up into a cone, but the dark hair is about an inch long all over and he’s got a little nose and tiny fingers and even tinier finger nails. Will has to blink to get the tears to fall so he can see and he sniffles. That’s his son and his wife, his amazing, amazing, superlatives-won’t-cover-it _amazing_ wife, made him. 

Habitually, Will looks up at the clock.

It’s 7.07 p.m.


	38. Chapter 38

Will’s not really sure what happens exactly after, and in which order. The baby cries intermittently against Mackenzie’s chest as she holds him, probably because women keep coming over to do things to him (they re-suction his mouth, for example, and do his Apgar scores; he gets a seven and then a ten; they all get ID bands). She cries too, for a little while, and Will finds himself crying slightly too, before sniffing it all back. The medical team take care of things _down there_ and with Mackenzie and the baby. He’s not sure how long it takes for the placenta to arrive, but it does at some point, and he’s vaguely aware of someone asking Mackenzie if they want to keep it. She says no. He doesn’t know how long Mackenzie lays with her legs wide open, but she does, for all the room to see. The spotlight that was on her ass during the birth, is now in her vagina while Katherine takes care of her post-baby. He half hears something about putting a few stitches in, and there’s a lot of conversation about how everyone seems to be doing, though he’s not included in that quantifier. There’s a lot of positive, empowering talk thrown around about how Mackenzie did an amazing job, is an amazing pusher, is an incredible, strong woman, and the baby’s got good strong lungs and is a good pooper (he’s already gone on Mackenzie); someone puts a striped hat on him.

The noise ebbs and flows, with patches of total quiet, and moments of almost chaos, when everyone talks at the same time, and the baby cries. He notices Mackenzie spends most of her time looking away from the baby but he doesn’t know whether that’s a normal response, because he’s never seen a woman give birth before. Not in real life. He mostly tries to stay out of the way so that the professionals taking care of his wife and his son can take care of them. He does lean down to kiss Mackenzie’s damp forehead and she half glances up at him and he thinks that she might not know what to do now either. He thinks to take a few photos and isn’t sure if Mackenzie even notices him doing so, but she’s come back to herself, asking questions about what’s going on with her vagina (Will figures that after all of that, he’d want to know too), with the baby, and with how the birth went.

Casey and the other (Will assumes) nurse periodically clean up the baby’s poop, and readjust him against Mackenzie’s bare chest (the rob she is in is open at her front), while he wails. They’re so confident with him, just moving him when they need to, not particularly treating him with kid gloves. Each time the layers of blankets come off, Will gets glimpses of his tiny, naked body, his pink little bottom and legs curling up against his stomach. At the other end of the bed, Katherine and her colleague make sure Mackenzie’s delivered all of the placenta, stich her, and thoroughly clean her up. They put a sheet over her legs, though she still lays with them wide, in an A frame stance.

Will’s next job is to order Mackenzie’s dinner; he’s on his own. Mackenzie also asks him to take a proper photo of her with the baby, one in which she’s smiling. Casey takes one of all three of them. And then they kind of wait around. The room empties out. Katherine says she’ll be by later to check on them. Mackenzie thanks her and so does Will. The others leave too. Casey hangs around. She takes prints of the baby’s feet (one set for the hospital, one set to take home). Mackenzie thanks her too, for her help during the labour/delivery process, beating Will to it again. He feels tired, and maybe a little overwhelmed, and he knows he’s withdrawing into himself. Casey asks them about any names and Mackenzie confesses they haven’t settled on anything. Will still can’t remember what was on the list, but it’s over there in the hospital bag.

Mackenzie and Casey talk about feeding, and at some point the baby must show signs of wanting to eat, so Mackenzie tries and gets a pretty decent latch the first time. Casey suggests she try again though, and she nails it the second time. The room gets quieter with the baby feeding (just colostrum though). Casey goes into the annex where the baby’s first proper examination will take place, to get it set up and ready. They’ll do it before the McAvoy’s are moved to their private suite. And finally, _finally_ , Will and Mackenzie are alone. With their baby. Mackenzie looks up at Will, still standing by the bed. She gives him a tentative smile and he comes closer, so she doesn’t have to crane her neck. “Hey.”

“Hey,” he echoes. “How are you doing?”

“Sore,” Mackenzie gives a little wince. “But I’m ok.” When she whispers, her voice gets very husky; it’s endearing (and sometimes it turns him on). Will reaches out to tuck some of her hair behind her ear. It doesn’t reach. “How are you doing?” Mackenzie asks him.

“I’m ok,” he responds. His feet are so sore, he can’t feel them anymore. And he knows as soon as he stops, he’s going to not be able to get going again.

Mackenzie licks her lips. And then does it again. “You need some water?” Will offers.

“Please,” Mackenzie says, like it’s the best thing she’s heard in ages. Will goes to find her water bottle, asking if she still wants the berry or plain. Mackenzie opts for berry and he returns to the bed, popping the cap so she can drink one handed while their son is at her breast (their son. At her breast. Like it’s not the first time that’s happened). “Thank you,” Mackenzie says softly. Will puts the lid back on the bottle. “So, how are you doing?” Mackenzie asks again.

“I’m ok,” Will repeats, holding her gaze. “Maybe a little overwhelmed,” he says lowly. He doesn’t want Casey to hear.

“Me too,” Mackenzie says.

“Well,” Will gestures to the baby. “I’ve got nothing on you. You’re amazing.”

Mackenzie gives him a soft smile, almost proud. She reaches her hand to him and he takes it. Her hand feels warm. “You were great today,” she says. “Couldn’t have done this without you.”

“You need anything else?” Will changes the subject.

“Mm about eight hours sleep, a strong coffee and a new body?”

Will gives a slight chuckle. “If I could,” he says.

Mackenzie gives a quirk of her lips, because she knows just to what lengths he’d go to make her safe and happy.

Casey comes back in to see how they’re going (she also checks to see how Mackenzie’s bleeding). She suggests switching to the other side, and helps Mackenzie manoeuvre the baby over to the other breast. Will moves out of the way to give them some space, feeling a little like a superfluous male. It feels surreal. To have gone through that long, laborious process, to spend all day focusing on one thing, and for that one thing to suddenly be over, and for his role as birth partner to abruptly cease. He’s spent months planning for the arrival of his son, and now his son is here. He’s got to shift his whole life to a whole new mould (and he’ll find as soon as he gets one thing figured out, the baby will go through a developmental change and all Will has learnt and practiced becomes redundant again). Mackenzie struggles a little to get the baby to latch on the other side, wincing with the pain of it when the latch is wrong, but she doesn’t lose her patience or burst into tears as she perseveres, and Will watches with a strange sense of awe and pride.

She’s going to be an amazing mother. He can only hope he can keep up.

 

 

**********

 

Casey’s a real sweetheart and Will’s grateful that she’s their nurse, and taking care of his two-hour old, as yet unnamed, son (it feels increasingly wrong to just refer to him as ‘the baby’ when he’s a person). He stands by as Casey does her checks on the little guy in the annex next to the room where Mackenzie gave birth. He’s naked on what looks like an oversized plastic bassinet, lined with a blanket, and with a big warm lamp on over the top, to make sure he doesn’t get cold. The kid’s testicles are massive (not uncommon for new-born boys). Will can’t help looking at them, which feels oddly perverted when it shouldn’t really be; it’s his son. He also looks over his son in his entirety, marvelling at the tiny toes and long dark hair, that sticks up in odd places after his quick sponge bath. He’s looking much more like a pink baby boy, and Will hopes he’s just as healthy. So far, everything seems to be going well. He’s regulating his own temperature, he’s fed, he’s breathing just fine. He’s had his antibiotic eye drops and the jab of vitamin K. Will’s kind of proud of the little guy.

Behind him, Katherine is back to check on Mackenzie, so Will stands by on Dad duties. He’s actually managed to touch his son, rubbing at his shoulder after the shot and he screamed his head off, trying to sooth. And he found his voice too, letting his baby boy know his Daddy was there. The baby is actually on a set of scales and they ping to indicate they’re done with the reading. Will looks up at the digital readout: 9 pounds 12 ounces.

“Wow, a big boy!” Casey says warmly to the baby, who is quiet, though constantly moving; dark greys searching and intermittent cries.

‘ _Poor Mackenzie_ ,’ Will thinks.

Casey notes the weight on the records, and comes back with a measuring tape. She places it carefully along the back of the baby’s head, moving him onto his side so she can line the tape down his back, around the curve of his rump, and down to his foot. “Fifty one centimetres,” she announces. “Twenty inches,” she converts. “A big boy.” She moves away to note that down too and the baby turns onto his back himself, startling, and then starting to cry. “Shh, shh, shh,” Casey says softly as she comes back to measure his head, and he quietens down, mostly at the touch, Will thinks. “Thirty four and a half centimetres, which is…” she hesitates as she converts it. “Thirteen and a half inches. Perfect,” Casey gives him a smile.

‘ _Poor Mackenzie_ ,’ Will thinks.

“So that’s pretty much that done,” Casey tells him and Will looks down at his son, who is quiet on the makeshift bed. “And we’ll just do the physical exam,” she goes on, leaning down to run her hands over the baby’s head. He starts crying again but she continues on, unperturbed, shushing him gently in a soothing way. She checks in his mouth, and in and behind his ears, the pulse points in his shoulders and groin, his hips and reflexes. She shows Will how he grips with his fingers and his toes, how he’ll flange his toes when the bottom of his foot is tickled, and his startle reflex, which Will has already seen, but Casey tests again. Baby boy McAvoy squalls intermittently.

“We know he can poop,” Casey says happily as she checks his bottom and genitals, and then turns him over to put him on his knees and arms, a similar position to the one he was born in. “Let’s check his crawl reflex,” she explains to Will, showing him how the baby pushes his feet out (though he seems traumatised to have his face in a blanket; he tries to lift his own head). Will’s amazed that he can do that at nearly two hours old. Casey runs her finger down the baby’s back, showing how it’s nice and straight; he goes quiet again. “Everything looks great. Passed with flying colours!” She says to the baby, turning him over again. When she puts him down on his back, his arms move out to the sides and he starts crying a new. “There’s that startle reflex,” she points out and Will ‘mm’s’ that he saw it. “You did so good!” She enthuses to the little guy. “Shall we get you wrapped up again and back to Momma, so you can move to your new room?”

She puts the hat back on him, and a diaper, and swaddles him expertly, with Will watching on for tips he can steal for himself. When she’s done, Casey scoops the baby up and takes him back to Mackenzie, and Will follows after them, a little lost. It’s nearing nine o’clock and he’s starting to really feel this day. Another nurse has arrived to help move Mackenzie, and Will quickly tosses their things into the hospital bag ready to go. He can hear his wife talking to the baby, settling him as he gives more intermittent cries. He follows his wife’s bed through the hospital corridors, to the other side of the Greenberg Pavilion, reminding himself that there is a world outside of the birthing suite, and it carried on while his flipped on its axis today.

The private suite is much nicer. There are large, floor to ceiling windows (currently with the curtains closed), and dark wood cabinetry (a proper closet and shelving). There’s a TV mounted on the wall, DVD player, plush reclining chair, fold out couch (for Will to sleep on – partners are only allowed to sleep over in the private rooms), and roomy bathroom. Even though they get to their own room finally, they’re not quite left to it. Casey hangs around to make sure they’re settled. She checks on Mackenzie’s bleeding again. She watches as Mackenzie tries another feed (and Will thinks, already? But his son’s stomach is the size of a marble and it’s been over an hour since his last feed). Mackenzie’s dinner arrives and Will helps her eat it (putting food on the fork for her, not spoon feeding her), because she’s holding the baby with her right arm. He unpacks their things a little, putting clothing in the drawers (Mackenzie rolled his t-shirts into cylinders because she insists they can get more into a smaller bag, and she’s right, of course, but it takes him a few extra moments deciphering which are his and which are hers), having the last granola bar because he’s way too tired to go and find something decent to eat. He’ll be fine until the morning. He has some water. He thinks to give Mackenzie her water bottle back.

At some point Casey goes and Will sits on the couch next to his blanket and pillow and looks over at his wife and she looks at him, their son at her breast and he thinks ‘ _now what?_ ’

He’s a father, holy shit.

“You look tired,” Mackenzie says.

“I am,” Will admits.

“Me too,” she says.

Will nods. “Of course. Big day today.”

Mackenzie gives a wry smile and looks down at their son. The smile blooms into something beautiful and she looks happy. It warms Will’s insides and he feels relief that she’s good with this. “I think, after this, I’m just going to go to sleep.” She looks over at Will and he nods.

“You need anything else?” He asks.

“I don’t think so. I’ll take a shower tomorrow.”

Will nods.  He yawns. Mackenzie gives him a sympathetic expression. “Go to sleep.”

“Are you ok?”

“I’m fine,” she insists. “This will take a while, and then I’m just going to go to sleep.”

Will reaches for the blanket and shakes it out, twisting so his legs are up along the edge of the couch (though they hang off the end, even as he moves so his head is right up hard against the wall), and throwing the blanket over himself. It’s fairly warm in the room and this will do; he’s exhausted. He falls asleep almost instantly, fully clothed, and with his shoes still on, and with the hope that Mackenzie will be all right without him.

(Of course she will).


	39. Chapter 39

_3 rd February 2014_

_Monday_

 

Will starts to become aware, thinking ‘ _shit I need to be awake’_ though he doesn’t quite know why. He pries open his eyes and is disorientated about where he is, and then it floods back to him and he sits up hurriedly, looking over the room. Mackenzie’s in the bed, basically where he left her, feeding their son. “Hey,” she greets softly.

Will gives a croak in response, his body slowly becoming awake, and with it, all the aches he picked up yesterday; back, legs, upper arms, feet. He feels like shit. He clears his throat and tries again, asking his wife what time it is.

“Just after nine.”

The curtains are partially open (the couch is under the windows, so the side that isn’t obscured by furniture has been opened. The curtain directly over where he was sleeping is still pulled across) and he can see it’s clearly day light. She means nine in the morning. He’s slept twelve hours. “Shit,” Will breathes.

“You must have been tired,” Mackenzie says.

Will swings his feet to the floor, the blood rush making his aches pulse. He untangles himself from the blanket and rubs the sleep from his eyes. He stands and takes painful steps to the bathroom, desperately needing to pee. When he comes back, he’s walking a little easier, but Mackenzie still gives him a concerned expression. “Are you ok? Maybe you should have set the bed up properly.”

“Are you ok?” Will asks, looking down at their son feeding against his mother, his eyes dark slits as he stares at his mother’s breast.

“We’re ok,” Mackenzie says softly, and reaches for him with her free hand. Will can see her breakfast, half eaten on the tray, and the water bottle he gave her last night empty. He takes for her hand, so she doesn’t have to reach further, and she tangles their fingers. “A few quick questions.”

“Shoot.”

“Have you got my wedding rings?”

“Yes,” he blinks at her. He tugs them free of his shirt to show her that they’re safely around his neck.

“Ok, good,” Mackenzie looks relieved. “Also, have you got my phone? We should probably start calling people.”

“Yes,” Will says. He takes it from his pocket. Wow, he must have been tired last night. He didn’t even think about what was in his pockets. His wallet is still in the back of his jeans. He gives the device to her and she gives him an apologetic expression, “Battery’s flat.”

He takes it back and finds the charger from their hospital bag, plugging it in at one of the outlets above his wife, so the device will reach her in bed. He checks his phone. It’s got one tiny red bar left on the battery. “You can try mine?” He offers.

“I’ll wait for it to charge,” Mackenzie dismisses. “Mum must be wondering what the hell happened to me yesterday; I’m sure she text.”

“She did. I text her back.”

Mackenzie gives him wide eyes. “What did you say?”

“Just that everything was fine. Talk later. Something like that.”

Mackenzie gives a little nod. “I’ll call her later.”

“How was your night?” Will asks, shifting his weight more evenly on his aching feet.

“Good. I kind of woke at the end of every sleep cycle to check on this guy, so I’m feeling it myself, but we’re good. He latches great and I think he’s eating ok,” she looks down at her son as she speaks and it strikes Will a little more that this has really happened.

“You were awake in the night?” Will asks.

“Yeah, they suggest feeding every time he’s awake, to encourage a good milk supply, so I –”

“I didn’t hear him,” Will says, obviously, seeing as he slept twelve hours straight.

“He doesn’t really cry,” Mackenzie says, looking at him.

“You could have woken me,” Will says.

“I couldn’t have –”

“Yes you could –”

“Did you want me to wake you every forty minutes?” Mackenzie shoots back.

Will purses his lips. Well, no, that sounds awful, but…

Mackenzie looks back up at him, and tugs on his hand a little to make sure she has his attention. “Can we talk?” She asks, her eyes unsure and Will thinks now would be a good time to not engage in nit picking. If he wants to be woken, he should tell her in advance, not berate her for not doing it after the fact.

“Of course,” he says gently.

“Thank you for yesterday,” Mackenzie plunges on. “You were incredible –”

“You were incredible,” Will murmurs, interrupting.

“But, I didn’t have to think about anything but what was happening with my body, which is exactly as it should have been, so whatever else happened, I know you took care of it.”

“There wasn’t really anything,” Will tries.

“I wasn’t expecting it to go all my way,” Mackenzie goes on. “I was half expecting something to happen, for you or someone to tell me that they were going to have to do something, or maybe the baby wasn’t ok, but I think it worked out almost exactly as we planned. It was incredible and I know it was you. I couldn’t have done this without you at all. No regrets not having a doula. You were _perfect_.”

Will purses his lips, because he doesn’t quite feel like he did much of anything, despite his body telling him he actually did. “Nothing compared to what you did.”

Mackenzie gives him a slight upturn of her lips and her dark eyes are intense on his. “Don’t dismiss it, Billy. We did different things. What you did is just as valid.”

Will feels a little pride bubble in his chest. “I’m glad it was ok,” he says, a little awkward. “Considering.”

“Considering,” Mackenzie repeats. “In my head I basically repeated three thoughts: this is meant to happen, I can’t do this, and Will’s here.”

 _Will’s here._ The implication in that is huge.

“You told me to shut up at one point,” he volunteers, because he’s trying to keep the conversation going. They haven’t had a chance to debrief yesterday. One of the things he learned at Daddy Bootcamp, is that the mother’s need to talk about their birth experience. It’s a trauma, and trauma lessens with talking about it (Mackenzie told him that too, when she told him about being stabbed – _each time I tell the story it gets less,_ she insisted, when Will said she didn’t have to tell him about it upon discovery of the massive scar). He was also warned mother’s might not remember every detail of the experience, because that’s how their hormones have been designed, but he will. He’ll remember all of it.

“Did I?” Mackenzie gives a half laugh. Her fingers tighten against his. “That’s awful. Why did I tell you to shut up?”

“You don’t remember?” Will asks.

“A lot of it’s very hazy. I remember triage and being in the birth suite. I remember being in the shower for a little while.”

“A long while. Twice,” Will corrects.

“Twice?” Mackenzie repeats, her eyes going a little wide. “I don’t remember getting in or out.”

“Do you remember sitting on the toilet?”

“Hm, I remember needing to go, but not being able to go, and then we went back to the bed,”

Mackenzie frowns.

“We sat in the bathroom for an hour,” Will tells her.

“Christ. On the toilet?”

“Yeah,” He confirms, shifting the weight on his feet again. He wants to sit. They could have this conversation while he’s sitting. Except, he doesn’t really want to let go of his wife’s hand.

“That must have been a sight.”

Will opts to not tell her about everyone seeing everything (but she probably already knows, given the appointments she had before the baby was born, and the ones she’s had after). Or the image he has of the baby’s head coming out of her vagina, an image he thinks will be with him for a while.

“I think we talked about me squatting to give birth,” Mackenzie frowns. “But I just wanted to be leaning over. That felt more right.”

“Katherine was great,” Will says.

“She was,” Mackenzie agrees readily. “And the nurses. I can’t remember their names.”

“I don’t either,” Will says. “Just Casey. She was with us all day and through the delivery, and she was taking care of you both afterward.”

“Casey,” Mackenzie repeats. “I’ve had someone else this morning.”

Will raises his eyebrows. “What have I missed?”

Mackenzie informs him of her morning, breakfast arriving, the new nurse, Rosie, coming to check on them sometime in the night, shortly after Casey left, bringing the birth certificate paperwork to fill out, helping Mackenzie to the toilet, talking her through the involved process of clean up after toilet (no wiping); she tells Will about the incredibly sexy mesh underwear she has on and the massive wad of ice pack and padding against her poor vagina, and haemorrhoids, yikes. She’s taken pain killers. They’re safe for the baby. She desperately wants a shower, but she’s not allowed to go alone.

“Why not?” Will asks. He gives up on standing and turns the recliner around to at least face his wife and son in bed. He winces as he sits, his thigh muscles sore, his feet pounding as he takes the weight off of them.

“I could get dizzy and fall – are you in pain?” She asks.

“I’m fine,” Will lies.

“Want to try again?” Mackenzie says, in her no-nonsense tone.

“Just sore muscles,” Will says. “I’m an old man. It happens.”

Mackenzie looks him over and he bears the scrutiny, but she doesn’t grill him on it. “Seriously though, Billy,” she says in a serious tone. “You were really amazing yesterday.” She gives a slight laugh. “I can’t think of better adjectives.”

Will gives her a slight smile. “Neither can I.”

“I just want to be clear that I _appreciate you_ ,” she says pointedly, taking Will back to the counselling days (boy, does that feel like a lifetime ago). “I really do. I was starting to feel like I couldn’t do it, when I was pushing forever, and you said you could see him, and that really helped. That made me think he was right there and you were telling me at one point that we were doing it together, me and him – that was really amazing.”

Will gives her a more prideful smile. He notices the tears in Mackenzie’s eyes and he gets up again to give her a kiss. On the mouth. “I really appreciate you too,” he murmurs softly. And leans in to kiss her again.

“He’s awake!” Comes from the doorway and Will pulls away, busted.

“The great sleeping husband,” Mackenzie jokes with the nurse, and he feels a little embarrassed.

“I’m Rosie,” she introduces herself.

“Will,” he responds and they shake hands.

“You must have been exhausted,” Rosie says to him. “I heard you were an amazing birth partner yesterday.”

She did?

“Birth partner of the year,” Rosie goes on to him. “Helped Mackenzie go completely natural,” she gives him an impressed expression.

He feels embarrassed for a different reason.

“You not hungry honey?” Rosie turns to Mackenzie.

“I got distracted,” she confesses of her mostly uneaten eggs and toast. Rosie urges her to eat and drink. Will goes to get more water from their bag and Mackenzie thanks him. They talk about the baby’s eating (he seems to be doing fine, and is nearly done, Mackenzie thinks – he stops and starts. Will hasn’t noticed, and feels like an ass). Mackenzie asks about the shower and Rosie says she’ll get Mackenzie a sitz bath, whatever that is, to sit in before she gets under the water. Mackenzie asks for more pain killers, and while they talk about other things, Will moves to open the other curtain. It’s snowing. He’s surprised by it. The weather’s been stable the last few days. He keeps himself busy with other things, while the women talk, getting out the insurance things he needs to sort and finds the list of baby names. He reads through them, but nothing in particular pops out at him. He’s aware that he has also not showered since Saturday and that he reeks! (those stress sweats), and he’s hungry. His stomach rumbles loudly, but the other two women don’t seem to notice. He drinks half a bottle of water to fill it with something for the time being – he’s going to have to go down to the cafeteria. He takes the birth certificate information and has a read through and Rosie leaves. Mackenzie pops their son from her breast and moves awkwardly to pull her robe closed again, while the baby rests against her sternum.

“Can you take him?” She asks.

“Sure,” Will hesitates. Only slightly. But Mackenzie picks up on it.

“Problem?” She asks carefully.

“No,” Will says. But he’s still not even sure… and he’s not awake enough (he needs a freaking coffee!!) to pretend he’s confident. “I don’t know how,” he says and meets his wife’s eyes. He gestures with hands to indicate he doesn’t know how to get the baby off of her.

Mackenzie gets the baby into her hands, one behind his neck, the other under his ass, and lifts him up to Will, who puts out his arms to receive (like he practised at Daddy Bootcamp). She closes her robe and Will brings the baby into his chest. He’s asleep, but Will bounces a little anyway, holding his son awkwardly, like he’s never done it before. He hasn’t. This is his first hold. He didn’t get a chance yesterday.

“That’s something I want a photo of,” Mackenzie says from the bed.

Will looks up at her. “Daddy’s first hold?” He asks without thinking.

Mackenzie frowns at him slightly. “What do you mean first hold?”

Oops.

“I mean,” Will starts and then can’t be bothered. “I didn’t get a chance yesterday.”

Mackenzie’s frown goes to horrified concern. “You didn’t get a chance?” She repeats. “When?”  
“Exactly,” Will says. “When?”

Mackenzie looks chagrined.

“Not you,” Will says. “It was busy yesterday. Everyone, including me, wanted you to bond. And then I slept for twelve hours.”

Mackenzie takes her phone from the charger and turns it on. “Still. Will.”

“I know, I know,” he interrupts. “I’m going to be involved.”

Mackenzie looks up at him from the bed, tears welling in her eyes again. “I can’t do this without you,” she says.

“You won’t be,” Will insists, coming closer to the bed again. He doesn’t feel confident enough to release one of his arms to be able to touch her, but he gives her a very intense look instead, and though her lip trembles for a second, she seems to accept that. She plays with her phone and then raises the device to take a photo of him holding his son.

“You might want to fix your hair before I –” She gestures with the phone.

‘ _Could have told me that before the nurse came in_ ,’ Will thinks, leaning down towards his wife. “Can you?” He means for her to do it.

“Yeah,” she says softly, reaching up.


	40. Chapter 40

“How does it feel to be a Daddy?”

Will looks from his son’s sleeping face to his wife’s sleepy face. “Surreal,” he says softly.

Mackenzie blinks at him. “Surreal in a good way?”

Will looks down at his son, the tiny nub of a nose, the dusting of dark eyebrows, the little strawberry bud of his mouth, and feels an overwhelming feeling of, well, being overwhelmed. “I don’t know yet.”

“Too late to take it back,” Mackenzie says casually.

“I wouldn’t,” Will says seriously, looking over at her again. She gives him a slight smile. “Do you want to sleep?”

“I really want to take a shower,” Mackenzie counters with a slight whine.

“Ok, well, let’s do that,” Will moves to put the baby down in the plastic bassinet by the bed. He wants to shower too. And brush his teeth. And get something to eat. And get a coffee.

“I don’t want to interrupt your cuddle,” Mackenzie tries but she’s too late. Will puts the baby down in the most awkward way he can manage, trying not to jostle his son while also trying to get his arms out from under him. He’ll get better at it. Then he straightens up, his back protesting.

Also, they have paperwork to fill out, people to call.

“Fuck,” Will turns to her, panicked.

“What?” Mackenzie gives him wide eyes.

“I have to call Jim,” Will looks up at the clock on the wall, even though he’s wearing a watch, but panic subsided; he’s still got time before he needs to call his executive producer.

“I’d really like to call my parents first,” Mackenzie counters. “Wouldn’t seem right if they weren’t the first to know.”

“Sure,” Will agrees. Mackenzie takes her phone off the charger again and goes to hand it to Will. “What are you doing?” He asks her.

“Do you want to do the honours?” She offers.

“They’re your parents, you don’t want to tell them?”

“You can do the honours,” Mackenzie says.

Will takes her phone and scrolls through the contacts until he finds ‘Mum’ and presses to connect the call. “What time is it over there?” He asks, putting the phone to his ear.

Mackenzie shrugs. “Plus five hours?”

The difference is actually four.

“Hello?” Anne answers.

“Hi, Anne, it’s Will,” he speaks, feeling his heart start to pound with the excited anticipation of sharing the news that his son has been born. It does seem right for his grandparents to be the first to know of his existence, outside of this hospital.

“Oh,” she says.

“I’m calling to let you know Mackenzie had the baby yesterday. Last night,” he corrects himself, in case she wants to know why it took so long to get this phone call.

“Oh goodness!” Anne says loudly. Will catches Mackenzie’s eye and she smiles broadly at him; she heard that from over there. “Boy or girl?”

“Boy,” Will answers. “Nine pounds, twelve ounces. Twenty inches.”

“Oh gosh a big boy. How’s Mackenzie doing?”

“She’s good,” Will says, giving his wife another smile. “And the baby’s good.”

“Name?”

“Uh, we haven’t decided on a name,” Will says and Mackenzie gives him a slightly horrified expression.

“John,” Anne says and tells her husband about the baby.

 _She’s telling your father,_ Will mouths to Mackenzie and she gives him a funny expression. He can hear John in the background, a murmur, and Anne repeating the details Will’s just given her. _You want to talk?_ Will silently asks his wife. She nods. “I’ll put Mackenzie on,” Will says to Anne, hoping she’s still able to hear him while she talks to her husband excitedly. He hears a vague ‘ok’ before handing the phone over.

“Hi Mum,” Mackenzie says, her face splitting into a smile.

Will goes around the bed to plug his phone into the charger. He scrolls through the contacts to find Jim’s number and calls him now.

“Hey Will,” the younger man answers.

“Jim,” Will starts. This feels weird, telling his executive producer that he’s just had a baby. “I’m not going to make it in today. Mackenzie’s had the baby.”

“Oh, wow,” Jim says, sounding enthused, but calm. “Congratulations!”

“Thank you,” Will says, cracking a smile.

On the bed, Mackenzie’s telling her mother how long she was in labour for, and boasts she did it completely drug free. “I really did,” Mackenzie insists seriously.

“Ok, well we’ve got everything covered here, so just, enjoy being a Dad,” Jim offers.

“Thank you,” Will says again.

“Will,” Mackenzie says, in what Will assumes is a response to a question along the lines of ‘who was with you’ or ‘how did you manage’.

He turns away to concentrate on his own phone conversation. “I’ll get an email out to the staff,” he tells the younger man. “Save either of us having to repeat ourselves a thousand times.”

“Sounds great,” Jim says. “So it was a boy?”

“Yes, nine pounds, twelve.”

Jim makes a whistling noise.

“Yeah,” Will agrees.

“And everyone’s ok?” Jim asks.

“Yes, Mackenzie’s here actually. She’s just talking to her mother.”

“Oh ok.”

“I’ll put her on,” Will nudges his wife and indicates his phone, mouthing ‘Jim’. She nods and starts to wrap up her conversation.

“Oh, don’t bother her.”

“No it’s ok,” Will says and they stay on the line in silence until Mackenzie’s ready. “Ok, I’ll see you,” Will says to Jim, indicating he’s about to leave.

“Ok, congratulations again,” he offers. “See you next Monday,” and Will hands the phone over.

“Hi Uncle Jim,” Mackenzie says sweetly into the phone, giving her device to Will, assumingly to put on a surface somewhere. Will uses it to draft an email to the staff. “You are too,” Mackenzie says. “We’re family you and I.” She pauses. “Since that time – I’m not mentioning it! I’m just saying. You know since when.”

Will sits in the recliner to type out his email. Mackenzie has the zoom on her phone up because she’s long-sighted, but he finds himself squinting at the screen a little. Maybe it’s time to get reading glasses himself.

 _Mackenzie and I are pleased to welcome to the world a healthy baby boy, as of seven p.m. last night_ , he types. _Nine pounds, twelve ounces; twenty inches long. Everybody’s doing well. Name to follow. Love from Will and Mackenzie._

There’s probably some people on that list that don’t need the ‘love from’ but Will doesn’t care. He’s mostly thinking about their _News Night_ staff, and he supposes Mackenzie can compose her own email to Pruit and anyone else she wants to contact. He waits for her to get off the phone before passing her device back to her to fact check. She asks him for her glasses, and he has to get them out of their hospital bag.

“Hey, do you mind if I go get something to eat before we do the shower thing?” Will asks. “I’m feeling faint myself.”

“Of course not,” Mackenzie takes her glasses from him. “You poor thing. Did you even eat last night?”

“I had granola bars.”

Mackenzie gives him a sympathetic pout. “Of course you should eat. I have to have a sitz bath before I can get in anyway.” She gestures to the contraption Rosie brought in before all the phone calls started.

“What is a sitz bath?” Will asks as she reads.

“It’s warm water for my arse,” she says absently.

Will turns his lip up in disgust and checks he still has his wallet in his back pocket. If he remembers correctly, there’s a café back near the main entrance. “I’ll just go down and get something and come back up,” he says.

“Sure. Wait,” Mackenzie’s head comes up. “Can you set up the bath for me?”

“Of course,” Will says, going to the contraption and taking it and the salts into the bathroom. Rosie gave them quick instructions. It inserts into the toilet bowl so that Mackenzie can sit in it.

“I’m going to attach a photo to this,” Mackenzie calls from the other room. She means the email.

“Ok,” Will says. He measures out a scoop of salts and fills the bath with warm water from the tap. He hopes it’s not too hot. Then he wonders which photo she attached. Hopefully the one Rosie took just before of the three of them, with Will holding the baby, and his hair not sticking up; that was a good one. “You need anything else?” He asks, back in the suite.

“No, thank you,” Mackenzie says.

“I’ll run,” Will offers.

“Don’t. I’m scared you might end up getting yourself admitted.”

“You want anything from the café?” He ignores her comment.

“No thank you. My lunch is going to be here soon.”

“When I get back,” Will says, watching his wife slowly, and painfully, make her way out of bed (he debates about whether he should jump in to help). “We should talk about a name.”

“Definitely,” Mackenzie agrees, looking over at him.


	41. Chapter 41

The best laid plans, inevitably are undone.

Except their birth plan, that one went according to plan. For the most part.

Will goes down to the Au Bon Pain café (not pain, as in ouch, which would be inappropriate for a hospital café, but pain, as in bread – the good bread) and orders himself an espresso and then picks something from the cabinet, which he devours while waiting for his coffee (he throws it back quickly, no time for savouring). Then he gets something else for his ‘lunch’ and heads back to the Greenberg Pavilion, ready to give Mackenzie her shower. But when he walks back into their room, he finds Rosie and some other guy he doesn’t know in there.

Mackenzie gives him a smile as he comes in and introduces him to Dr Hemingway, their son’s paediatrician (Will vaguely remembers that name, but Mackenzie picked). Dr Hemingway shakes his hand and says hello and Will says hi back. The baby is awake in Mackenzie’s arms, wailing a little, as she soothes him to sleep.

“Dr Hemingway just did the baby’s physical exam,” Mackenzie explains.

“How was it?” Will asks, coming to stand on the other side of the bed, opposite the doctor.

“Everything looked great,” he reassures the new parents. He goes over some things they need to look out for, like the amount of wet and poopy diapers, and fevers; basic symptoms for serious and common illnesses. He also goes over umbilical cord care, demand feeding, and how they should put the baby down to sleep in his bed (on his back). He’s got pamphlets, which he hands over. He asks Mackenzie if she’s seen a lactation consultant, or gone to one of the breastfeeding classes. She says ‘no’ but Rosie speaks up that the baby is feeding well, and has a good latch. Dr Hemingway suggests the class anyway. There’s a big long list of things they need to remember as new parents and it strikes Will that once they go home, probably tomorrow, they’re going to be alone with their baby. Alone. It seems like a big scary thing, but Mackenzie doesn’t look worried, so he tries not to either.

Dr Hemingway gives Will an appointment card for next Monday, for the baby’s first paediatric appointment. He asks if they have any questions for him. Will stands there stupidly, not sure what he should ask because he hasn’t had the chance to actually do anything with his son yet. Mackenzie asks how long it’s going to take for the umbilical cord to drop off, and when it does, if it’s ok to start actually putting the baby in the bath. It is. But of course, babies don’t get particularly dirty, so there’s no urgent need to bath him every day. Dr Hemingway reminds them to check the water temperature with their wrist, to make sure the room is warm with no drafts, and to never leave him unattended in the water.

Seems clear, but then Will’s noticed they get a lot of what seems like obvious information, which suggests it’s not so obvious to some.

Then again, he can’t fathom someone wanting to hit their three-year-old either, so what does he know?

And then as soon as Dr Hemingway leaves, Katherine comes in to check on Mackenzie and how she’s healing (and wants to have a look). Rosie manages to leave to check on another patient and come back, while they’re still talking. Will goes to the bathroom and finds the sitz bath still sitting there in the bowl (he wonders if Mackenzie even got around to using it). He takes it out and tips it down the drain, uses the toilet himself, comes back and finds the two women still talking. The baby wakes and nurses. Mackenzie’s lunch arrives. Katherine finally leaves. She promises discharge for tomorrow. Will opts to take his shower while Mackenzie and the baby eat. He shaves and washes his hair and feels somewhat human again; he can imagine Mackenzie feels gross after yesterday. After his coffee, and a change of clean clothes and deodorant, he feels much more alert.

He goes to suggest Mackenzie take her shower next, as soon as she’s done with the baby and her lunch, but she begs him off. She’s tired. She wants to nap. She looks a little teary.

“Ok, whatever you want to do,” Will says gently. He moves to sit in the recliner. “That was a lot of information earlier.”

“With Hemingway?” Mackenzie asks, sipping her orange juice.

“Yeah.”

“Yeah,” Mackenzie agrees. “But nothing particularly new.”

“No,” Will agrees. “Do you worry you’ll forget something?”

“Do you think I’m going to?” Mackenzie asks.

“No,” Will says immediately. “I meant, in general. Actually, I meant me.”

“You’ll be fine,” she dismisses, seeming almost annoyed.

Will sits back in the chair and goes quiet. He can feel caffeine in his veins and he’s happy. He won’t nap when Mackenzie does. He’ll take care of some of the little things; the paperwork, the insurance, anything else he can find that needs doing.

“Do you want to take him?” Mackenzie asks after a while.

“Sure,” Will agrees, getting up. The baby is in the crook of Mackenzie’s arm, asleep, or so Will thinks. Mackenzie lifts him into Will’s arms and the baby cracks his eyes open at Will for a second, without looking at him at all. Will instinctively rocks him side to side and his eyes close again. He makes slight noises as he settles and Will watches intently, moving around the room a little, away from the bed. He seems so small, and he’s so brand new. When Will turns back to face the bed, Mackenzie has gone to sleep.

 

 

**********

 

Will starts with the insurance company. He has forms to fill out and he does so, down to everything barring the baby’s name. Then he fills out the forms for the birth certificate, including all the questions it asks about Mackenzie’s place of birth, her legal name (her maiden name – which in this case, is still the same thing), her level of education at the time of the birth, her employment, ancestry, race, health, how many cigarettes she smokes a day, height, and weight. The only question he hesitates over is whether she experienced depression at any time during her pregnancy; he wouldn’t presume to know, and leaves it blank for her to answer. The questions for him stop at race. He fills in all the boxes, except the ones for the baby’s name.

He sorts the paper work and shuffles through the folder he has in the hospital bag, bringing the things they’ll need for discharge to the top, while moving the things they don’t need now to the bottom of the stack. He leaves the list of baby names on Mackenzie’s table tray to remind them. They don’t have to do it before they’re discharged, but Will thinks they should. People are waiting to hear, and also, he wants his son to have a name. It doesn’t quite feel right that he doesn’t have one yet.

There are a few other things Will could do while Mackenzie naps, but that would involve leaving the room and he doesn’t want to leave her with the baby if she’s not aware that she’s supposed to be keeping an eye on him. Will watches his son sleep for a moment in his bassinet, then decides to take him for a walk. There’s one more phone call he wants to make, and he doesn’t want to wake his wife. He wheels the plastic bassinet to the door and slips out. Their suite is at the end of the corridor, so he heads down to the window at the end and takes his charged phone from his pocket. He scrolls through the contacts, his stomach tightening with anticipation. He should have made this phone call months ago. A year ago.

“Hello?”

“It’s Will,” he identifies himself. Of course, his sister has his number and he assumes it’s in her phone, and he figures the caller ID came up with his name…

“Oh. Hi.”

“Hi,” Will echoes.

“How are you?”

“I’m good. How are you?” He echoes lamely, his son jerking in his sleep a little. He instinctively moves the bassinet back and forth gently. His son. Unreal. And then he thinks: his sisters gave birth. Not that he really wants to picture them giving birth, but now that he understands what a massive thing it is, he… well, he kind of has a new found respect for them.

“Fine,” Tracey says.

“Listen,” Will says, even though there’s dead air. “I’m calling because Mackenzie had the baby last night.”

“Oh,” Tracey says. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you.”

“I thought she was due a month ago?”

“Uh, no, she was due a few weeks ago.”

“Oh. Well, congratulations. Welcome to parenthood.”

“It was a boy,” Will volunteers when she doesn’t ask. “Nine pounds, twelve ounces. Twenty inches long.”

“Phew! Poor Mackenzie,” she starts to warm to the conversation.

“Yeah,” Will agrees, a slight smile. Because he’s impressed with his wife, not because it’s amusing.

“And everybody’s doing ok?”

“They are,” Will confirms. “Mackenzie was amazing. She did it completely naturally.”

“Seriously? Brave.”

“Very,” Will agrees. “And the baby’s fine too.”

“That’s good.”

There’s a moment of silence and Will knows she’s wondering why he called her now. She’s not exactly enthused with the conversation. She hasn’t asked about a name. He doesn’t blame her. After all this time. He can’t remember the last time they spoke in person. Probably his father’s funeral?

“Listen,” Will says again. “I’m sorry I haven’t called. I should have.”

“You’ve had stuff going on,” Tracey says, cool again. “We all do.”

Will wonders if there’s something he should know about.

“But yeah, you could have called.”

Will swallows. “After Dad’s funeral –”

“Everyone’s already moved on Will,” Tracey interrupts.

Will takes a deep but silent breath. “I’m sorry,” he says again.

“Well, congratulations again and good luck with everything.”

“Thank you,” Will says softly.

“Don’t be a stranger ok?”

“I won’t. I’d like the baby to meet his family.”

“We’d like to meet him too. And your wife,” Tracey adds.

“Yeah. You’ve met her.”

“Not as your wife,” Tracey points out.

Will feels ashamed. “Yeah,” he says again, conceding.

“You know where we are.”

“Yeah,” Will says again. He does. He’s always known. “We could come out this summer.”

“Let me know when,” his sister responds. “There’s space here.” She means at her house, which is not the old family home. That might be wiser. Will realises she’s continually passing the ball back to his court, challenging him to actually make a plan and to follow through on it and he resolves to do so. He doubts Mackenzie will have a problem with him suggesting they spend a week or so in Nebraska for the summer. He tells Tracey he’ll be in touch and she says ‘ok’ in a casual way, like she’ll believe it when she sees it, and it’s totally deserved.

“I’ll be in touch,” Will promises.

“Any time, big brother,” Tracey says, and it warms Will’s heart to hear it. He’s been a shit. He’s been so caught up in himself for a long time, since he and Mackenzie broke up, but even before that. Since he struck his father over the head with a bottle. His life was slowly spiralling out of control. He succeeded academically and professionally, but at the expense of falling apart emotionally and psychologically. Staring down at his son, stirring in his hospital swaddle, in his hospital bassinet, Will feels differently.

This is a whole new start.


	42. Chapter 42

Will ends the call with his sister and takes a moment to look at his now awake son in his bed. His little eyes are open and he jerks his head and body as he tries to figure out this strange new life he’s appeared in (it must have been a hell of a rabbit hole). Will reaches down and cups his fingers around the back of his son’s still misshapen head. His skin is warm and his hair soft and Will can see the dark eyes are actually grey, as they stare fixedly to the side. Will leans in closer towards his son’s face and he stares at a different spot, responding to the movement near him, but not looking directly at his father.

Too soon for eye contact.

The baby gives a wail. Will moves his hand to the little body and gives his son a gentle rock. He wants to let Mackenzie sleep. Especially if she’s had the baby on her breast every hour last night. That’s pretty intense. He gets why she’s doing it, to get a good milk supply to come in, and to practice feeding the baby as much as possible, particularly while they’re still in the hospital and there’s a lot of support around. But there is a part of Will that thinks ‘that’s too much’. That’s a lot of dedication. Mackenzie needs to sleep too.

The baby gives another wail, a little louder this time, and the wiggle intensifies. He smacks his lips and shifts his head from side to side and it dawns on Will that those are signs he’s hungry and wants to be fed. For a second, Will’s torn. He wants to take a shift and let his wife sleep, and yet, he can’t feed his son. He also knows Mackenzie wants to encourage her milk to come in. He slides his phone back into his pocket and wheels his son back to the suite. He knows he’s woken his wife as soon as he’s come in, but she doesn’t bitch about it and holds out her arms to take her son. She talks to him as she opens her robe to feed him, and Will marvels at how easily she does it, talk to someone who’s completely unresponsive. Not completely unresponsive. He can see the small ways the baby does respond to her, settling at her touch and the sound of her voice. Mackenzie gives a wince as the baby latches on.   
“Does it hurt?” Will asks her, hovering.

“No,” Mackenzie says, but sounds unsure. “Just feels _really_ different.”

‘ _I can’t imagine,’_ Will thinks.

“I filled out the birth certificate forms,” he says instead. “And the insurance.”

“You’ve been productive,” Mackenzie notes. “Can you pass my water?”

Will hands it over. “I called Tracey.”

“Thank you. You did?” She meets his eye, surprised. “That’s really _great_ Will,” those dark eyes soften on him immediately. “You told her about the baby?”

“I did. I said we might go out there in the summer, so they can meet.”

“That sounds like a really wonderful idea,” Mackenzie enthuses. “He can meet all his cousins and his aunts and uncles.”

“And you too,” Will says.

“Yes,” Mackenzie agrees softly; she knows what he means (there are a lot of cousins she hasn’t met yet). “I’d like to meet them all too.”

And Will feels like he’s done his wife a great injustice by not doing this sooner (he’s just been running so far from that life for so long…). He’s about to start apologising for it when Rosie comes in to check on them. She eyeballs Mackenzie’s latch and deems it good. She encourages Mackenzie by telling her she’s a natural at this and Mackenzie looks pleased. She asks if they need anything, but Mackenzie says they’re fine. Rosie reminds them ‘quiet time’ is coming up and asks them to put their phones on silent and try to use softer voices if they’re going to be outside of their room. ‘Quiet time’ is a chance for everyone on the ward to rest.

Alone again, Will gets conversation back on track by showing Mackenzie the questions on the birth certificate she needs to fill out herself. She gives them a quick once over and ticks the box for ‘never experienced depression during my pregnancy’ (which is nice to hear) and then asks him what else they need to fill out.

“The name,” Will says.

“Oh Christ yeah, we _really_ need to do that right now,” Mackenzie agrees. “Have you got the list?”

Will produces it with a flourish.

“Lay it on me. What’s on the list?”

Will perches at the end of her bed (his feet still ache) and Mackenzie moves her feet out of the way to make room for him, even though he’s nowhere near close to sitting on them. “Ethan,” he reads off the top.

“Ethan,” Mackenzie repeats looking down at their son on her left breast. “Ethan, Charlie, McAvoy.” She stares at their son a moment. “I don’t know, what do you think?” She looks up at Will.

Honestly, reading through the list earlier, none of the names jumped out at him. “I don’t mind the name,” he says. “But he doesn’t look like an Ethan.”

“I agree,” Mackenzie says firmly. “What else is there?”

“Noah,” Will answers.

Again, Mackenzie looks at their son and repeats the name and then turns to Will with her nose turned up. He doesn’t look like a Noah either. Nor a Ben, James or Michael. Mackenzie throws her head back against her pillow with an exaggerated sigh. “This sucks. We’re never going to come up with a name.”

“Sure we will,” Will immediately soothes. “We don’t have to do it right now.”

Mackenzie looks down at her son and Will goes quiet, sensing his wife’s frustration and not wanting to get his head bitten off too much. The thing is, he agrees with her. Their son doesn’t look like a Michael or James or Noah or Ethan. He could be persuaded on the Ben, but Benjamin Charlie McAvoy doesn’t have quite the ring to it that feels right. Mackenzie looks over at Will again and she looks tired, but less wary. “You know what he looks like? He looks like a ‘Charlie’.”

Will blinks at her and moves from the end of the bed.

“I know you don’t want to name him after Charlie but –”

“I never said that.”

“I think it’s a good – I thought you did.”

“No,” Will says. “You called dibs for the middle name.” He looks down at his son, jaw powering away at his wife’s breast (been there, buddy; different reason though – ok, he just weirded himself out) and thinks ‘ _yeah, your mother’s right’._ “He does look like a Charlie,” Will says aloud.

“Do you think so?” Mackenzie gives him hopeful eyes.

“I do. Charlie McAvoy.”

“Has a ring to it,” Mackenzie says casually.

“It does,” Will says quietly. Is he really going to name his son after his best friend and mentor and pseudo father?

“Shall we just forget about a middle name?”

“Seems easier,” Will shrugs. He pauses a moment and they both look down on their son. They created life!

Will fucking procreated.

“Charlie William McAvoy has a ring to it.”

Mackenzie looks at him carefully. “It does,” she agrees softly, so that her voice goes husky. “Are you ok with that though? You realise you’re naming your son after you?”

“I realise,” Will says and finds he actually doesn’t mind. It feels kind of nice, like a legacy, or maybe something that’s positive, tying the both of them together. He feels almost proud to bestow his name on his son, and maybe like he can half determine his son’s future now; like it’s a promise of a good one.

“If you’re ok with it, then I’m ok with it,” Mackenzie says. She finds Will’s hand and gives it a squeeze and Will leans down to kiss her. He hasn’t kissed her properly in two days. Not that he was particularly counting, it’s just, in that moment, he realises he hasn’t. Mackenzie gives him a slight hum and looks pleased.

Will realises something else. “Thank you. For him,” he indicates their son. “You’re amazing and I love you.”

Mackenzie’s eyes brim with sudden tears. “I love you too.”


	43. Chapter 43

Mackenzie finishes feeding Charlie (oh, see now, so much better that he has a name), and Will fills in the last details of their paperwork. He delivers the birth certificate forms to the nurses station, and then while he’s snuck out on his family, goes to the gift store to buy his wife some flowers. He also gets a bunch for the nurses station and they gush over him a little when he delivers them. Mackenzie gushes over him too when she receives hers. Of course, the impact is a little lost in the fact that she’s sitting in a sitz bath when he does it, but the thought is there (though he does wish he had thought to do it that morning, closer to when she gave birth, so it doesn’t look like he only just thought of buying her flowers to say thank you, and is more considerate).

“How long do you have to sit in that thing?” Will asks from the bathroom doorway, not sure whether he should go in, or get out.

“I think fifteen minutes?” Mackenzie checks her phone. “Kelli, Don, Sloan, Maggie, Elliot, Tamara, Tess, Martin, Kendra, Neal, Julian, Riley, Chris, Gary, Grady, Pam, Jan, who also wants to know about a statement, and Jenna have emailed to say ‘congratulations on the baby!’ and Martin added he ‘hopes your’,” Mackenzie looks at him. “Y-O-U-R doing ok. Who taught him to spell?”

“Wasn’t he one of your hires?”

Mackenzie narrows her eyes at him. “No,” she scoffs. She gives him a frown. “You can come in and sit down if you want.”

Will thinks ‘ _what if I can’t hear the baby?_ ’ but given how his feet still ache, and his back is definitely killing him, he complies, perching on the seat for the shower, a sigh escaping him.

“Are you ok over there?” Mackenzie asks.

Will looks at her, ass dipped in warm, salty water. “I’m fine.”

‘ _Compared to you_ ,’ he adds in his head.

“And Millie,” Mackenzie says, checking her phone again, sans glasses, so holding the device a mile from her face to be able to read it. “She says ‘congratulations super woman’.” Mackenzie looks over at him with a bright smile.

“Definitely superwoman,” Will echoes. “Have you told Pruit yet?”

“No, but thank you for reminding me,” she turns back to her phone and types out a message. “And what are we going to say in our statement?”

“Our personal lives are no one else’s business but ours?”

Mackenzie finishes with her message and then looks at him. “Happy to announce the arrival of Charlie William McAvoy on Sunday the second of February. Everyone is doing well. Thank you for your well wishes.”

“Who’s sent us well wishes?”

“Our entire News Night family?” Mackenzie waves her phone at him.

“Is the statement for them or for a public with an odd investment in our personal lives?”

“Listen to me, celebrity snark, you were the one that went out and got famous. We’ve been over this, we release a statement, or we find photographers camping outside of the hospital trying to get a photo of us going home.”

“They might do that anyway if we alert them to the fact that we had a kid.”

“They might notice that I’ve disappeared off the face of the earth for three days and that I’m not pregnant anymore,” Mackenzie points out, even though she still has a significant swell to her belly.

“I’m having difficulty taking this conversation seriously while you’re sitting on that thing,” Will says.

Mackenzie narrows her eyes at him again. “Fuck you, it actually feels quite nice. A little odd, but nice. Also, if you want any chance of getting in there ever again, you’re going to have to handle it, or leave the room.”

Will doesn’t move. “The statement sounds fine,” he concedes.

Mackenzie plays with her phone some more and then asks him to help her up, and starts on her shower while Will empties out the bath to clear the toilet for other use. Feeling more paranoid about not being able to hear the baby over the noise of the shower, he brings the bassinet to the door, and stands so he can see his son and his wife at the same time. She moves slowly in the shower, but laments that the warm water feels heavenly. She asks Will to get her shampoo from the toiletries bag on the counter. When he turns back, he finds her sitting on the shower chair that he moved into the cubicle for her. “You ok?” He asks, remembering he’s meant to be on standby for fainting.

“I got tired. I just need to rest a moment,” Mackenzie says.

“Take your time,” Will suggests.

“Did they bank the baby’s cord blood?”

“What?” Will asks, confused.

“After the baby was born, we were going to bank his cord blood. Did they do that?”

“I have no idea,” Will confesses. “I didn’t remember to check.”

“It was in the birth plan, right?”

“Yes,” Will confirms. “I’ll ask someone.” He means later. Mackenzie nods. From the counter, her phone buzzes. Will looks at his son, but he’s still asleep. Mackenzie sits under the water, the shampoo and conditioner bottle in her hands. She doesn’t look too pale; just her usual shade of white.

“I think I’ll have to wash my hair another time,” Mackenzie says softly. “I’m just feeling really pooped.”

Will steps forward, “I’ll do it.”

She looks up at him gratefully. “My saviour, really.”

“Hardly,” Will says, holding out his hand to take the dollop she puts in his palm. He massages the soap against her skull.

“Mmmm looking like a fucking saint at this point,” Mackenzie moans against the tiles.

Will tries to stand out of the reach of the water as he runs his fingers over his wife’s head in the wet space, but the water mists his shirt and shoes anyway. It doesn’t matter. The hospital is warm, his shoes will dry, and he can roam in his bare feet if he must (or steal a pair of the slip free socks the hospital has given Mackenzie).

“Tracey text me,” Mackenzie says.

“Hm?”

“Tracey. She text me.”

“I didn’t know you… were in touch.”

“I said I’d emailed her about the wedding?”

“Right,” Will’s memory jogs.

“She just wanted to congratulate me on the baby.”

“Right,” Will says again.

“I thought that was nice,” Mackenzie says tentatively.

“It is,” Will agrees gently. He doesn’t want her to feel like she’s not allowed to be in contact with his family. He’s really got to end the isolationism; build bridges instead of walls. Will reaches into the water to rinse his hands and takes down the nozzle to start rinsing the shampoo from his wife’s hair. “Did you hear from any of your sisters?”

“Yes, they’ve all gotten the news from Mum and have sent appropriate and inappropriate well wishes,” Mackenzie tips her head back, her dark eyes sliding closed.

“What are inappropriate well wishes?”

“Meredith said something about me finally seeing what it’s like now.”

Will pauses. “Did you not see before?” He asks, because he’s curious about this sibling rivalry.

“Apparently not.”

He finishes rinsing her hair and gives her the head of the shower while he does the second round of shampoo, massaging her skull again. “What about you?” Mackenzie asks. “Have you contacted all appropriate parties?”

“I don’t know,” Will says thoughtfully. “I figure Tracey will tell Sarah and Jay-Jay.”

“Mm,” Mackenzie agrees as he works.

“I don’t really have anyone else to tell. Everyone I know is everyone you know.”

Mackenzie gives a slight laugh. “That’s not true. There’s your agent and –”

“Technically, an employee.”

“So are our staff at ACN, but they’re also friends. It can happen.”

“Press release is fine,” Will counters. “We’re not close enough to warrant a personal text.”

“Gideon?”

“I haven’t heard from him in a while.”

“Oh,” Mackenzie says softly.

“I’ll text him,” he promises. He rinses his hands off again and takes the water nozzle to rinse his wife’s hair. His back aches from the angle and he notices he’s hungry again. He forgot to each the lunch he bought earlier. “Do you think it would be inappropriate to let Habib know. Personally, I mean?”

“I don’t know. Why inappropriate?” Mackenzie frowns, even though she has her head back and her eyes closed again.

“Rules about doctor-patient professionalism.”

“Oh. I don’t think so. I think he’d like to know. And from you might be nicer.”

Will nods, even though she’s not looking at him. He gives her the water back and holds out his hand for the amount of conditioner she deems sufficient. He finger-combs it into the mid-length shafts, and the ends, like he was taught so many years ago. He rinses his hands off and leaves her for a moment, going to sit on the closed lid of the toilet. Mackenzie looks over from her perch in the shower. “You ok?”

“I’m fine,” Will says.

“Don’t do that Will, don’t pretend you’re ok when you’re not because you think I’m too unable to handle it,” Mackenzie says suddenly. “Or because you think your suffering is less than mine, like it’s even on a scale, and your complaints are somehow unwarranted.”

Will hears the rest of it too, even though she doesn’t say it: don’t shut me out. Share, communicate, don’t withdraw. “My back hurts,” he confesses.

“From sleeping on the couch?”

“I don’t think that helped, but no, I think it was initially from leaning over you during the labour.”

Mackenzie gives him a pout. “I’m sorry. Have you taken something for it?”

Will twists his mouth to the negative.

“I’m sure the pharmacy will have something mild,” Mackenzie points out.

“Yeah,” Will says getting up and going for the door.

“Are you going now?” Mackenzie asks, surprised.

“No, I’ve just remembered I haven’t taken my other medication,” Will says, going past his sleeping son in his bassinet, right outside the bathroom door, and on to the shelf where he unpacked the anti-depressants earlier to remind himself to take them. When he comes back to the bathroom, Mackenzie is rinsing out her own hair, so Will hangs back. She does ask him to shut the water off, and stands really cautiously. Will hands her a towel and she dries herself off slowly, and dresses carefully. Will watches her ‘build’ her underwear, placing a large pad first, then a witch hazel wipe for her bum, an ice pack for her perineum, into the bottom of hospital issued, disposable, mesh underwear.

Poor Mackenzie. 

Rosie comes in as Will’s helping Mackenzie into a nursing gown and reminds them ‘quiet time’ is about to start (she also quickly changes the bedsheets now that Mackenzie is out of them). She asks how the shower went and if everything’s ok, and do they need anything, and when they say they’re fine and no, they’re good, she leaves again.

“I might take another nap,” Mackenzie says to Will wrapping her hair up in a towel.

“Me too,” Will agrees. “I’m going to have something to eat first.”

“Oh, food sounds good,” Mackenzie gives him a wince. “I’m so hungry.” They head out of the bathroom, Will going to the cupboards to see what snacks remain that he can offer her. “Oh hello,” he hears Mackenzie greet their son. “What are you doing here by the door?”

Will remembers the filled roll he bought earlier that was going to be his lunch and after Mackenzie gets into bed, wincing all the way as she squashes her stitches, he offers it to her. “Where did you get this from?”

“The café,” Will answers, changing his damp shirt, if he’s going to have to go get more food.

“Was this your lunch?” Mackenzie asks.

“It was going to be,” he says, making sure he’s got his wallet.

“Thank you,” Mackenzie says, giving him the soft, adoring eyes.

“I shall go gather more supplies,” Will announces.

Mackenzie crooks a finger at him and he approaches the bed. “Kiss,” she demands. “I’d tug on you but I don’t want to hurt your back further.” Will leans down to give her a kiss on the mouth. “Stop by the pharmacy too.”

“I will,” he promises. “You want anything else?”

“No, I want for nothing,” she gives him a sweet smile.


	44. Chapter 44

Will talks to Rosie at the nurses’ station about whether the baby’s cord blood was banked and she looks up the records for him, confirming that it was. Will goes on downstairs to get himself lunch, and both of them supper, for later that evening, in case Mackenzie is hungry after dinner, or even just some time in the night. He also gets Mackenzie more flavoured water. He stops by the pharmacy to get himself some over the counter pain medication, and while he’s in there he sees a little teddy bear with _Charlie Bear_ stitched inside of a blue love heart on the stomach, and gets that too.

Back in the suite, Mackenzie is feeding the baby, and a part of Will thinks ‘Christ, again? Already?’ It’s one thing to know and another thing to experience it, and feeding the baby every few hours seems like a lot of time on paper, but hardly any at all in real life. “I got you midnight snacks,” Will says, putting the bag on Mackenzie’s tray table.

“What have you brought me?” She asks, reaching with her free hand.

“ _Midnight_ snacks,” Will says pointedly, moving it out of her reach. She pouts at him. “I got you cookies.”

She gives him a brilliant smile. “You’re so good to me.”

“The least I could do,” Will says. “I got something for the baby too.”

“You did?” Mackenzie asks curiously.

Will produces the teddy bear from the pharmacy bag.

“Aw,” Mackenzie gushes, taking it from him. “Look what your Daddy got you,” she talks to Charlie, wiggling the bear near him. Will doubts the baby takes any notice of it. He sits on the couch to eat his sandwich, taking some of the pain medication he just bought, washing it down with plain water.

After a while, Mackenzie switches the baby to her other side, putting the _Charlie Bear_ on the tray table out of the way. “Hey, have you changed his nappy?” She asks casually.

“No,” Will answers, standing to put his waste in the trash.

“Me either. I mean, we did it this morning, but I haven’t done it since then.”

“Was I supposed to do it?” Will asks. “Am I not following a schedule or?”

“No, no schedule,” Mackenzie looks up at him. “I just figure we should check, right?”

“I suppose?” Will raises his eyebrows at her. “I can’t remember what the books said. Isn’t he going to cry if he’s wet?”

“Ok, we’ve _got_ to start _checking_ ,” Mackenzie says seriously.

Will has an urge to write it down. Like he needs to add it to his list of things to do. He tells himself not to be stupid. It’s his son, he can remember to change his diaper. He thinks. The next thing he does is fold out the couch to make up his bed properly this time, and half draws one of the curtains; he’s going to nap too. He remembers the water in the bag and gets that for his wife, which earns him a grateful expression. “How do you know when he’s awake?” Will asks, sitting on the end of his bed to take his shoes off.

“His eyes are open?” Mackenzie points out the obvious.

“I meant, how were you awake in the night?”

“I slept with him on me, so I slept pretty shallowly,” Mackenzie explains. “And every time I woke, I checked to see if he was awake.”

“Are you going to do that now?” Will asks, checking his phone for messages (none).

“Actually, I’m curious to see if he’ll cry and wake me,” Mackenzie says.

“So we’re just going to sleep?” Will asks.

“Yes.”

“What if he doesn’t wake up?”

Mackenzie looks over at him, alarmed.

“I meant, to feed,” Will clarifies.

“He’s not going to starve to death.”

“Ok. I thought you wanted to feed a lot to bring your milk in.”

“I do and have, but I also need to sleep,” she says, with eyes tired in their appeal.

“I’m just curious,” Will says. “I trust your judgement. They’re your breasts.”

Mackenzie gives a slight, huff of a laugh. “Last night was nice for bonding and practicing latching and taking care of him, but there’s no way I can do that over again tonight.”

“Understandable,” Will says, feeling guilty again that he slept that whole time while she was awake. “But, you can wake me if you need to.”

“We’ll see how we go,” Mackenzie says to their son. She looks over at her husband, “But I think one of us is going to need to be clear headed tomorrow when we’re discharged. I’ll wake you in the night all you want when we get home.”

 

 

**********

 

“This is weird.”

“Hm?” Will cracks his eyes open and looks across the room at his wife in the hospital bed. The baby is in his plastic bassinet, next to her; within reach.

“Have we ever slept in the same room together but not in the same bed?”

“No,” Will answers, lowering his head again, and closing his eyes. It is a little weird, now that she points it out. “I’ll make room if you want.”

“I’d love to, but I’m a little sore.”

 _‘Fair enough,’_ Will thinks. He falls asleep. About halfway through their afternoon nap he lifts his head and cracks his eyes to see if Mackenzie’s awake, but she is not, and he can’t hear the baby making any noise either, so goes back to sleep. At one point, he thinks someone’s come into the room, but he can’t quite wake enough to really comprehend, and rouses properly nearly two hours after they put their heads down for ‘quiet time’. What was a quick morning, is now turning into a slow afternoon. The evening gets worse as they try to stay awake beyond 7 p.m.

Will gets out of bed to go to the toilet, creeping across the floor in his socks, trying to be quiet, but when he comes out of the bathroom again, Mackenzie has her eyes open. “Did I wake you?” Will whispers.

“No, not really,” Mackenzie says, sitting up. “Come here,” she requests. Will complies. She pats the bed so Will perches on the edge of the mattress. “Turn,” she gestures. So Will moves to actually sit on the bed, within the frame of one leg (the other she bends in front of her), his back to her. She starts rubbing his shoulders, then trails her hands down his spine. “Whereabouts are you sore?”

“There,” Will stops her hands at the top of his lower back. She presses her fingers against his muscles. “That feels nice, thank you.”

“You do feel a little tight,” she responds. “What’s the ones you do?” She switches to the ‘spreading out’ technique.

“Did you sleep ok?” Will asks.

“I woke a few times, thinking I heard something.”

“Me too.”

“But he didn’t cry.”

“Is he asleep?” Will looks over, having to lean back and disrupt his back rub. The baby’s got his eyes closed, but is wiggling a little.

“I look for the rooting,” Mackenzie says.

“That’s the lip smacking?”

“No, it’s when he moves his nose around like he’s rooting for my boob.”

Will sits back and Mackenzie carries on where she left off.

“Before I feed him though, you can change his nappy.”

“Ok,” Will agrees. “Have you done one?”

“Yes, this morning with Rosie.”

“Oh, right, yeah, you said,” Will remembers. He hasn’t done one before. It’s a simple procedure, so he doesn’t know why he feels a little nervous. “You need anything?” He asks.

“No, what I want is for you to let me give you a goddamn back rub,” Mackenzie says lightly.

Will relaxes into it a bit more. “Atta boy,” Mackenzie enthuses lightly.

The door to their room opens and a head peeks around the edge of the gap. It’s Casey. “Hi guys,” she greets and comes in. They say hi back. “How is everyone doing today? Wow, you’re lucky,” she says to Will. “First time I’ve seen the mother giving the father a back rub twenty-four hours after the birth.”

It hasn’t been twenty-four hours yet.

“I figure I owe him one,” Mackenzie speaks up. “Spent all of yesterday rubbing my back.”

Will doesn’t argue with that. He kind of likes how she sticks up for him. He really is a good guy.

Casey goes around to have a look at the baby in the bassinet. She congratulates them on the name. She asks Mackenzie how she’s been going with feeds (good) and is he sleeping ok (more than good). She asks about Mackenzie’s pain, how she’s healing; she wants to have a look at the stitches quickly – which kills Will’s back rub completely. He tidies up his bed, for want of something to do while his wife has her legs spread (and maybe so he doesn’t accidentally look. He’s not sure he’ll come back from it). Casey announces everything’s looking good. Mackenzie tells her she’s had a shower and Casey asks how that went. She asks about the sitz baths, and encourages Mackenzie to have another at the end of the evening. “May as well make the most of it hey?” Casey suggests. She asks them if they need anything. They’re fine. “Dinner will be in soon,” she says.

“Before you go,” Will interrupts before she can leave. He hands her a box of chocolates. “Just to say thank you for yesterday.”

“You were really amazing,” Mackenzie adds.

Casey beams. “Thank you, that’s really sweet!” And then she leaves.

“Hey,” Mackenzie says to Will and he turns his attention to her. “You’re up,” she indicates the bassinet.


	45. Chapter 45

Ok, his first diaper. He can do this. He did one at Daddy Bootcamp, and that was on a baby a hundred times older than his son, who is still not twenty-four hours old yet. _Testicles are poo catchers,_ he remembers, but when he actually gets to his son’s diaper, there doesn’t seem to be anything there at all.

Will puts the baby down on the bed in front of his wife, and starts to unswaddle the already loosened blanket; an arm shoots free. “Wait,” Mackenzie says softly, reaching out to tuck her finger into the baby’s hand. He grips it immediately. He’s awake, and smacking his lips, but he’s not crying. “Get the other nappy ready first,” Mackenzie says.

Will looks over to the stack the hospital has provided for them and goes to get one. “And the wipes,” Mackenzie suggests. Will goes to get those too and then starts to unswaddle his son, who starts to cry. Will hesitates just a moment, but keeps going. “Aw, I know it’s cold,” Mackenzie says to their son. “But Daddy’s just going to change your nappy, really quickly, and then Mummy will give you something to eat.”

He doesn’t exactly manage ‘really quickly’.

Will lays out the blanket beneath his son and pulls the tabs on the diaper, his son’s arms and legs twitching as he gears up for a couple of full body wails, the stump of the umbilical cord wobbling around (it’s gross). “Hey, hey, hey,” Mackenzie soothes softly. Will puts the dirty diaper to the side, and gets the new one, opening it up and laying it by his son, then lifting his son’s legs to slide the clean diaper underneath his bottom. He’s awkward, not lifting his son high enough the first time (he’s scared he’s going to hurt him but ‘babies don’t break’) and he’s a little embarrassed to be sucking at this in front of his wife, for whom everything comes naturally. But he keeps going, because he also knows that the more he practices, the better at it he’ll get, and he doesn’t want to show weakness in front of his wife (who never judges him anyway), or his son, who keeps on crying, breaking Will’s heart a little.

Mackenzie keeps talking to the baby as Will works and he eventually gets the diaper on, the tabs stuck down, and he even remembers to fold down the top, so it doesn’t rub against his son’s healing bellybutton. Mackenzie shows Will how to adjust the diaper around the baby’s legs, running a finger under the elastic to untuck it, so that a proper seal is formed. He goes to reswaddle his son, who’s still wailing, but periodically calms (Will figures he’s trying to figure out what’s happening to him), but Mackenzie stops him. “I’ll do skin to skin,” she says. So Will picks the baby up, his large hands under the baby’s small head and back to hand him off to his wife. She positions the baby, who calms suddenly again, and gets her breast ready. “Ow no,” she says sharply and tries the latch again. “You can do some skin to skin after,” Mackenzie says.

“Hm?” Will realises belatedly that she’s talking to him. He’s packing up his diaper station.

Mackenzie looks up at him. “After I feed him, you can have skin to skin cuddles as well.”

“Oh, sure,” Will says.

Honestly, he likes that she just tells him what to do.

 

 

**********

 

Will thought yesterday was a long day. Today feels worse, or maybe it’s just that the memories of yesterday are already fading, the first to go: any sense of time. Mackenzie feeds the baby, and her dinner arrives. Will helps feed her, by bringing the tray in close, and scooping beef stew onto her fork when the baby’s on her other side and she’s feeding herself with her left hand. Assured that she’s fine, he goes to get himself something for dinner from Au Bon Pain. He gets more midnight snacks, just in case. He sits on his still folded down bed to have his dinner while Mackenzie finishes with the baby. Then Will takes him, having to remove his shirt for skin to skin contact with this son. The little body is warm as it curls sleepily against Will’s chest and he has to admit, that it’s a nice way to hold his little boy.

“Now that’s something I want a picture of,” Mackenzie says as she finishes the last of her dinner. She makes Will come closer so she can take a picture, and then gushes over how cute it is. Mackenzie takes herself to the bathroom, so Will settles on his bed, his son still against his chest. Charlie. With Charlie settled against his chest. Little Charlie. Will wishes Big Charlie could see him now. He thinks to contact Nancy and awkwardly digs his phone from his pocket, his hand balancing his son against his chest. He attaches one of the photos he took of the baby right after he was born, with the little striped hat on his head and his eyes open.

“Will?”

“Yeah?” He calls back carefully, not wanting to disturb his son.

“Can you help me?”

“Yes?” He says, getting up off the bed cautiously. He hesitates over putting his son down, but he’d have to wrap him in the blanket to keep warm if he’s going to give up his body heat, and if Mackenzie needs help… He goes to the bathroom, still hanging on to his son, to see what the situation is first. He pokes his head in, not sure what he’s about to walk into, and wanting to give his wife some sense of privacy, even if every man and his dog has had their face in her vagina recently.

Mackenzie’s on the toilet, looking wary. “I forgot the –” She gestures to the bottle of water on the vanity, that she’s supposed to use instead of wiping with toilet paper.

“Oh sure,” Will goes to get it.

“Can you refill it?” She requests quietly.

Will does so and hands it over and then vacates the bathroom to give her some dignity. “Your Momma went through something else to bring you into the world,” Will says softly to the baby. The baby sighs at him and Will’s heart melts a little.

 

 

**********

 

At eight pm, as their son officially becomes twenty-five hours old, they give up and go to bed (Mackenzie wants to go to sleep, and Will is happy to comply with whatever she wants). Mackenzie sets an alarm on her phone to wake her in four hours for feeding. That’s the maximum time recommended by Casey (and the antenatal classes, books, and websites) for letting the baby go without feeding. So, if he doesn’t wake them in the night by crying, Mackenzie will wake him instead. Will’s not as tired as he was that afternoon, so lays awake in the not-quite-darkness for a while, thinking. A sudden flare of siren nearby makes his heart pound for a moment, but it doesn’t seem to disturb his son (or his wife), and he thinks maybe they got lucky with a baby that doesn’t cry much.

So far, it’s been relatively easy.

(Watch him take that back.)

He asked Mackenzie to wake him when she was done with the feed, if he wasn’t already awake, so that he can do his fair share. He’s pretty sure her sleep debt is higher than his, and he’s not physically feeding another person from his own body, so has got to feel less exhausted than she does. She doesn’t argue with him, but he suspects she thinks it’s not the right thing to do. He doesn’t know that it is yet either, but they’ll figure it out at some point. There’s a lot to figure out, though not all of it needs to be done right now, even though he wants to. He wants to get it all right, now, before he’s had time to make mistakes. He tries to remember to talk to Mackenzie about the parenting classes he found. He tries to remember to talk to her about what kind of parenting style she actually wants to follow. He feels like she has a plan, knows what she’s doing, and he’s playing catch up. He needs her to help him.

He wants to be good for her.

He wants to be a good father.

As he’s lying there in the semi-dark (it’s never really dark in a hospital), he feels his phone buzz on the thin mattress next to him. He brings it up to this face to take a look, and it’s a message from Nancy Skinner, congratulating them both on a beautiful baby boy. She says the name is wonderful and she looks forward to meeting little Charlie William in person sometime. He texts Gideon, letting him know the baby was born, with the details about name and weight. He also suggests they go for a beer sometime. For a while, he hesitates over contacting Habib about the baby. He Googles to see if Jan in the press office has released the statement Mackenzie sent her earlier, and when he finds it is indeed out there, decides to send Habib a short message himself as well, even though he half suspects the therapist keeps tabs of Will in the press because Will doesn’t tell him about things. Or used to.

As Will’s putting his phone back on the mattress next to him, it buzzes. Will picks it up again. It’s Gideon:

 

**Congratulations! Great**

**news. Hope everyone is**

**well and getting some**

**sleep! It’s hectic here, but**

**going for a beer would be**

**cool when we get a chance.**

**Excuse my severe lack of**

**new Dad support. Slacker!**

Well, it’s a response, and it’s a positive response, Will thinks.

 

**Can appreciate a lot has**

**changed. Hope everyone**

**your end is well too. I’ll be**

**in touch re: beer. Take care.**

Will figures that’s the end of the conversation, but Gideon comes back with:

 

**Everything has flipped on**

**it’s ass. We’re hanging in**

**there. Catch you later man.**

**Stalk me if you have to.**

**Please.**

**Everything ok?**

 

**Just really tired and stressed.**

**Don’t want to put you off or**

**anything.**

**I’m here to talk if you want.**

**Doesn’t have to be over a**

**beer.**

**Yeah, maybe another time?**

**I’d appreciate it but don’t**

**want to unload on you. You’re**

**about to go what I’m going**

**through.**

**I’ll call you tomorrow.  We’re**

**supposed to be supporting**

**each other right? New-Dad**

**solidarity. You can give me**

**some advice and I’m happy**

**to be a sympathetic ear.**

**Thanks man. I think I’m**

**going to need your ear.**

Will leaves it at that, a little concerned for his friend, and a little freaked out for himself. He can’t imagine how the rest of his life will go, being a father. Gideon’s daughter is only a few weeks old, and he’s clearly finding things difficult. What if Will does too? Like Mackenzie said: too late to take it back. From the bassinet, the baby makes a snorting sound and Will notices his heart rate is up. He closes his eyes and focuses on his own breath, in and out, nice and steady. He conjures up the image of the blonde haired boy waiting for him with his mother in a field this time (has to amend that image to a brown haired boy), a beautifully sunny day, and tells himself that it will all be ok. Whether it will work out to be true or not, right now, he wants to believe.


	46. Chapter 46

_4 th February, 2016_

_Tuesday_

 

Mackenzie wakes four hours later to the chiming of her phone. It’s under her pillow, and mostly it’s the buzzing that pulls her from a slumber she was not ready to leave. She silences the phone and looks over to her son. He’s still asleep. It looks like Will is too; he doesn’t stir from his side of the room. It’s after midnight and she feels shattered. She’s also sore, her perineum achy and her uterus still crampy; and it starts to hit her that this is what her life is going to be like for the next few weeks. No escaping it. Just more of the same. And for a second, it feels like a big, overwhelming thing she’s done that she can’t take back. She’s committed to being a mother for the rest of her life, without really understanding what that meant; she didn’t have any previous experience to compare against. And of course, she didn’t really have a choice. They talked about having kids but the timing wasn’t exactly planned out, and once she was already pregnant, there was no turning back. There wasn’t any real way she would back out of this whole thing, once her son was already starting to grow. How could she? Not when she wanted him.

So she doesn’t have a choice. No, she does, her choice is to do this. Her day-old son is relying on her (and Will) to take care of him. To tell him that funny feeling in his stomach is hunger, and here’s something that will make him feel better. And that awful damp cold feeling against his bottom is a wet nappy, and here’s what they’ll do to make it better for him. For the rest of his life. Which feels like a very big, scary type thing, when she thinks about the enormity of it. But really, all she has to do right now, is feed her son.    

She moves slowly and carefully off the bed to grab a clean diaper for her son and the baby wipes and brings them over to the thin hospital mattress. Then she goes to lift him out of the bassinet, engaging abdominal muscles that are shot to hell, so she can try and save straining her back; he’s not a light boy, even if he seems quite little. “Hello,” she greets him softly. “Little Charlie. Are you awake?” She jigs him a little, upright against her shoulder, and checks; he has his eyes open now, staring straight ahead, focusing on nothing. “Hi,” she greets him. “Good morning. Shall I change your nappy before Mummy gives you something to eat?” She puts the baby down on the bed and unswaddles him. He starts to complain. “I know, I know it’s cold.” She moves to undo his nappy and finds dark, tarry, meconium poo; he cries louder. “Did you save your Daddy from this on purpose?” She asks wryly. It takes forever to clean up, and the baby cries at her, making her feel small, but she can’t stop halfway through to soothe him.

“You ok?” Comes from behind her and she almost cringes that Will’s awake now.

“I’m _fine_ ,” she says.

Will comes to stand next her, looking sleepy and she’s suddenly annoyed. “I can handle it,” she says, her tone terse.

“I know,” he says. “I just want to be involved.”

And she has a sudden flash of tears, and a pit in her stomach. “I know,” she says, her tone wavering heavily. Charlie continues to cry, full body wails, his arms and legs twitching as he gears up each lungful. “I’m sorry,” she says meekly.

Will puts his hand at her back, rubbing between her shoulders as she wipes her son’s bottom. “It’s ok,” he says softly, which only makes her feel worse. He’s the sweetest man. He broke himself just so she wouldn’t suffer too badly when she was in labour, and all he does is to be caring and kind for her. Of course, he thinks she can do this and that she’s fine, that’s not what his question was and she doesn’t know why she suddenly felt like she was being judged. He’s her number one champion. He’s constantly telling her that she can do anything and face anything. He’s the one with crippling doubts about his ability to be a decent human being, but he succeeds at it all the time and in all the ways he doesn’t even know. He doesn’t stop trying.

“You know,” Mackenzie stops what she’s doing. “Actually if you do this I can go to the bathroom.”

“Sure,” Will says easily, as if she hasn’t been mean to him and isn’t on the verge of breaking down with it, as if he didn’t struggle with the last nappy change he did (bless him), as if he hasn’t been woken in the dead of the night.

Mackenzie leaves them to it and tries to deal with herself. Except, when she sits, and goes (which stings), she looks over at the vanity and sees the bottle there, that she’s forgotten again, and feels trapped, and overwhelmed, and foreign in her own body, and starts to cry. In the next room, she can hear Will murmuring (or humming) to the baby, and eventually the crying stops and Mackenzie wipes away her own silent tears. She has a few more, but wipes them away, and sniffs back the last of it and then calls to her husband. There’s a moment, and then she senses him in the doorway, though he stays out of sight. “Yeah?” He asks casually.

“Can you –” Mackenzie stops as the tears threaten her throat again.

Will comes into the doorway to look at her. He has their naked son (apart from the clean nappy) against his shirtless shoulder. “What do you need honey?” He asks gently.

She reaches out to point to the vanity, where the bottle is that she needs to be able to get back off the toilet and he follows her gaze. He comes in to fill the bottle for her, a slightly longer process while he keeps one hand on his son, who is wiggling around, giving intermittent wails. She’s acutely aware that she’s wasting time, and her son his hungry and needs her.

“Thank you,” Mackenzie says softly as Will gives her the bottle. He leaves and she sorts herself out, sore and emotional and wondering why she’s falling apart at midnight when she was fine just a few hours ago, and all the day before.

Will is at the window with their son, looking out onto the street, which gives Mackenzie a chance to gather herself further as she gets into bed, raising the head of it to lean against while she feeds. Will hears her and comes over, a slow walk that includes an awkward bobbing and their son still makes unhappy noises that Will does nothing to shush, and doesn’t seem bothered about. Mackenzie pulls a pillow to her lap and Will lays the baby down for her, while she gets ready to feed. His mouth is already wide open, waiting on it, and the latch is good; he gets a mouthful of her breast. It hurts, for a moment, while her nipple gets drawn to the back of the baby’s mouth, but as his jaw starts working, the pain (not really pain, just a very odd uncomfortable feeling) quickly subsides and they both ease into a rhythm.

Mackenzie looks at her son against her breast, and thinks how strange it is that he’s her son. He’s made up, literally, of a part of her and yet he’s his own person. A day ago, he was inside her, and now he’s here. The tags on his ankle and wrist say that he’s hers. Hers and Will’s. But it feels strange. For a moment. That this person, this whole other being, is part of her, but separate.

Will goes to move away from the bed but she stops him, reaching out her free hand. He takes it and she looks up at him, suddenly with tears in her eyes again. He looks concerned but he’s learnt that he doesn’t have to rescue her, and so he waits. “I can’t do this without you,” she says.

“You don’t have to,” he responds.

“I know,” she kind of wails and sees her son’s eyes slide slightly towards her. She forces herself to look at her husband again. “I mean that I get that now. I can see I need help.”

“Everybody needs a little help sometimes,” he says quietly.

She sobs, but she’s not really crying. The tears fall but she doesn’t feel sad. Just, strangely overwhelmed or something. “I’m not even sure why I’m crying.”

“Baby hormones,” Will supplies, and perches on the edge of her bed, keeping hold of her hand, his palm large and warm against hers. His hand is the size of their son’s torso. He’s so small and vulnerable; while her husband is so big and strong.

“Right,” Mackenzie nods; sure, that probably makes sense. Will reaches with his other hand to wipe the salty wetness from her cheeks and it draws her eyes so that she looks right into his and she finds compassion there that oddly strengthens her. He feels for her, but he doesn’t pity her. He’ll stand like a pillar at her side, but he’ll never let his shadow fall over her face.

“I can’t do much in the way of feeding, but I can do the other things,” Will says. Mackenzie nods, because she also hears him asking her to let him. She doesn’t have to do it all alone, and he doesn’t want to let her either. “You have to look after yourself too.”

Mackenzie gives a meek nod of her head. It’s not even that she’s particularly tried to do everything herself. It’s not even that this is particularly hard. For some reason, it’s just catching up with her tonight. “Together, right?” Mackenzie says humbly.

“Yeah,” Will says. “Together. Well, all three of us,” he looks at his son and Mackenzie feels a prickle of tears again.

Yes, they’re the three of them now.


	47. Chapter 47

After the somewhat embarrassing meltdown at half past midnight, they sit and talk for a while. Will tells her about his texts from Nancy and Gideon. Mackenzie tries to think of something to make conversation about but finds, after two days, all she can think about is the birth, breastfeeding and how her arse hurts. All of which she’s sure Will would willingly talk to her about, if she wanted to, but she doesn’t want to.

“What’s happening in the world?”

“I have no idea.”

“I haven’t left this hospital for two days, give me something,” Mackenzie requests.

Will goes to get his phone and brings it back, taking his seat on the bed again. “Seahawks won the Superbowl.”

“Go the Seahawks!” Mackenzie enthuses.

“Do you even know where they’re from?”

“No idea,” she says.

“Seattle. They haven’t won before.”

“Go the Seahawks!” Mackenzie repeats. “Who did you want to win?”

Will gives a pout of his mouth, to indicate he didn’t care either way; he’s busy reading. “No other major disasters to report,” Will finishes with his phone.

“They might have a quiet week,” Mackenzie says. “We should have watched News Night.”

“We were asleep,” Will points out.

“Hm,” Mackenzie says. “It felt like the weekend.”

“It does,” Will agrees.

“It’s Tuesday though, right?”

“It is,” he confirms.

“Ready to go home?” She asks, watching him carefully.

“I think so,” he says cautiously. “We’re relatively self-sufficient now.”

Mackenzie feels a contraction tug at her uterus. It unsettles her a moment, as they have done since she gave birth, but they’re nothing compared to what she endured towards the end of stage one. “You can go to sleep if you want to,” she offers her husband, who looks warier than she feels. She is, at least, able to focus on her son, and stay alert to what he’s doing. They haven’t even gotten through the first breast yet. She watches Will hesitate a moment. He wants to. But…

“Do you need anything else?” He asks softly.

Mackenzie shakes her head gently. “I appreciate your help already.”

“It’s not help, it’s supposed to be co-parenting.”

Mackenzie gives a slight laugh. “I think continually having to come into the bathroom to give me water is helping, not co-parenting.”

“Well,” Will starts, then scratches the back of his head. “I signed up for marriage too. That includes helping.” He slides off the bed, his bare feet hitting the floor. He turns back to lean over the bed and gives her a kiss. “Don’t forget to drink some water,” he instructs before shuffling off to bed. Mackenzie considers herself reminded, and reaches for the bottle. She also reaches for a cookie.

 

 

**********

 

Little Charlie is getting better at feeding. What started out as an almost hour long process the first time, is closer to forty-five minutes, and so Mackenzie manages to get the light out again just after 1am. She resets her alarm for four hours and when it goes off and pulls her from another dead sleep, she gets out of bed to wake her husband to change the baby, while she goes to the toilet. She remembers her water bottle before she sits down on the loo, and sharing the parental duties with her husband means she gets back to sleep ten minutes earlier than when they were awake at midnight.

They’re woken a few hours later when Rosie, back on shift, comes in to check up on them. She goes through her usual questions, about how their night was, how feedings are going, how Charlie seems, how his diapers are, how Mackenzie’s doing, has she had a bowel movement since giving birth yet, how her pain management is going; do they have anything they’re concerned about? Mackenzie’s answers are much the same, she’s fine (no bowel movement), Charlie seems fine, (bowel movement). She’s looking forward to going home, but she’s also nervous about it.

“You guys are going to be fine,” Rosie immediately jumps in. “And you’ve got all the numbers of people you can call if something happens, as well as emergency services. You’re feeding _really_ well, which is awesome and Charlie’s doing fine. Dr Hemmingway will come in to check on him before you go, and he’ll know if anything’s not right. Don’t worry. You’ll be fine.”

She is right. Dr Hemingway does come to see Charlie and does yet another physical exam and announces that the little guy seems healthy and fine, and he would be ok with sending them all home. Katherine arrives towards the end of the exam and they consult on the McAvoy-McHale discharge. There are things they need to do first, such as the breastfeeding class, they have to watch the shaken baby syndrome video (yeah, again), and Charlie needs to have his screening tests done – for vision, hearing, and a few genetic and metabolic disorders (they’re going to check his heart too, given Will’s issue).

Katherine wants to take a look at Mackenzie, so Dr Hemingway leaves with Charlie to do the screening tests. Will decides to go and get a coffee and his breakfast (and pick Charlie up on his way back). Mackenzie shimmies her mesh underwear down, self-conscious that she’s a mess _down there_ , and Katherine has a look. “Looks like the swelling’s coming down,” she notes. She strips off her gloves and Mackenzie pulls the hospital supplied underwear back into place. “You’re still having contractions?” She bins her dirty gloves.

“Yes,” Mackenzie says. “I got a little emotional last night,” she volunteers as the OB/GYN washes her hands.

“About anything in particular?” Katherine asks, using paper towels to dry her hands. She comes to stand by the bed.

“No,” Mackenzie feels a little embarrassed. She can’t really remember what she was upset about now. “I’m sure it was nothing.”

“Well, you just had a baby. You’re bound to be emotional at times. It’s totally normal,” Katherine says kindly. “Lots of hormones in your system, and massive changes to your life. Plus, you experienced a trauma and that takes its toll psychologically, emotionally, and physically.”

Well, when she puts it like that.

“Did you talk to Will about it?”

“He was there, while I was blubbing.”

“What did he say?”

“What you said, mostly.”

Katherine gives her a slight smile and a nod. “Hang in there, it all gets easier. The pain will go away, the sleep deprivation gets better, you’ll remember you’re a person eventually.”

Mackenzie gives a harrowing laugh. “Right.”

“You’ve got people you can talk to if you need to,” Katherine reminds her. “Including my number.” Mackenzie nods. “Talk to Will though. He’s a man, sure, but he does ok.”

“He does very ok,” Mackenzie agrees. “I will.”

“And if it all starts to get too much to handle, speak up. Call people.”

“I will,” Mackenzie nods.

“Good,” Katherine says firmly. “So I’ll see you in six weeks for your postpartum check-up.”

“Yes,” Mackenzie agrees.

“Remember to take care of yourself.”

“I will.”

Katherine reminds her of a few other things, like taking care of her perineum, which includes no intercourse (fooling around is ok), and thoughts about contraception; she could get pregnant again (though Mackenzie doesn’t worry about that too much, given the frequency of her husband’s erections). After she leaves, Mackenzie finds herself alone. Alone, for the first time in days. If Will hasn’t been with her, a nurse or doctor has, and definitely the baby. But he’s in the nursery and Will is buying coffee and she’s alone. And it feels _weird!_ She should probably take advantage of it. But what to do?

She could take a shower, but damn, she should have asked if it were ok to. She doesn’t feel faint. Her blood pressure checks have been normal. She’s drinking water. It’s been more then twenty-four hours since she gave birth. Maybe she should wait for Will to come back. Better to be safe than sorry. She checks her phone and responds to a few messages. She checks the news alerts herself. Will is right, nothing much is going on in the world. Nothing that warrants her attention. Not that she has to pay too much attention to the news these days. She wonders how Josh Minahan is doing. She wonders if she should email him. She wonders if Will brought the books they were reading. She thinks about getting out of bed to go take a look.

Then her breakfast arrives.

“Hi!” She greets the orderly brightly.


	48. Chapter 48

“Ok, I’ll see you later,” Mackenzie says, stepping up to her husband to kiss him. She has to tuck her hand at the back of his neck and tug down to get their mouths to meet; she’s not in heels and she’s not doing tippy-toes right now. She gives him a bright smile when they pull back. “Haven’t done that in a few days,” she notes.

Will frowns at her. “Didn’t we kiss this morning?”

“No, you kissed me. _I_ haven’t kissed _you_ in a while.”

“Well,” he says, looking a little smitten. And then he clearly can’t think of any come back so leaves it and Mackenzie gives him another more amused smile this time, and walks off, pushing her son in his plastic bassinet. He’s awake, calm after his screening tests (finally. It took a long time to settle him – the hepatitis B vaccine was probably horrifically traumatic for the poor guy, but his heart is just fine!), and ready for a feed. She’s still not allowed to carry him in her arms if she’s going to walk around the hospital, and she’s not allowed to shower alone. Mackenzie realises what she’s looking forward to, is getting some sense of normalcy back. Yes, her normal is going to be really different with the baby, but while she’s a little nervous not to have professionals just down the hall should she need them (and she hasn’t really, so like Will and Rosie say, she should have more faith in herself), she’s also looking forward to having people not waltz on into their room, to being able to nap when she feels sleepy, to not having to flash her private parts to all in sundry. She’s looking forward to starting a routine with her family, at home.

Rosie leads the way down the corridor to where the breastfeeding class is being held (but leaves her there). When Mackenzie goes in she’s surprised to see just five other women there (out of sixty-eight beds on the ward). Must be a slow week on the maternity ward. The lactation consultant, Susan, welcomes her in and guides her to a comfortable recliner. She gushes over Charlie, asking to pick him up from his bassinet while Mackenzie gets situated (he starts crying, but Susan doesn’t seem bothered). She hasn’t fed in a chair yet and it takes her a moment to, firstly get into it while taking into account her bruised vagina (the woman next to her gives her a sympathetic expression), and secondly, get comfortable, with the pillow in the right place, to help take the weight of her son.

Susan hands over a still crying Charlie when Mackenzie’s ready, and she takes a moment to calm him before attempting to put him on her breast. Susan talks about how baby needs his tongue down and mouth open, ready for the breast, otherwise he won’t latch properly, and Mackenzie acknowledges the other woman’s vast experience, while thinking ‘I know’ and peppers her son with kisses to distract him from his woes. That works to stop him from crying, probably because he’s bewildered by the sensation (and the lip smacking noises in his ears), and Mackenzie lays him down in front of her. She’s always started with her left breast first. She gets it out with her left hand, while all other women in the room watch (there is not a lot of point in trying to maintain dignity while having a baby), and Susan narrates what Mackenzie should do (just as she’s doing it) and waits for Charlie to give her a big wide mouth, before she brings him to her breast with her right hand at the back of his neck and head, and latches him on perfectly the first time. It’s almost painful as he draws her nipple deep into the back of his mouth, but it subsides and then her breast tingles as it drops down, and she’s done it.

“Very nicely done!” Susan enthuses. “You’re a natural!” She congratulates.

A new woman arrives and Susan moves on. The woman next to Mackenzie leans over. “You made that look easy.” She looks tired. “I still don’t seem to be able to get it right.”

“I think it’s easy because Charlie meets me halfway,” Mackenzie confesses. And maybe because she managed to nail it right the first time he fed, and fed all through the first night, and they’ve already established good feeding habits.

“This is Daniel,” the woman introduces her son. “I’m Honor.”

“Mackenzie,” she introduces herself. They reach over for an awkward handshake over their children.

“When did you give birth?”  
“Sunday night. You?”

“Yesterday morning.”

Mackenzie gives her a sympathetic nod. “How did it go?”

“I tell you that epidural is a god send,” Honor gives a grateful expression. “But it slowed down my contractions too, so I ended up on the Pitocin and when that didn’t work, I had an emergency c-section.”

Mackenzie blanches. “God, that sounds awful.”

“It wasn’t exactly in my birth plan, but what can you do?” Honor gives a hapless shrug. “It’s made it harder with this one. I can’t pick her up easily and she was so sleepy from the moment she came out. What was your birth experience?”

“Actually, it was amazing,” Mackenzie says thoughtfully. “I did it completely naturally, which is exactly what I wanted, and my husband is a saint.”

“Wow,” Honor says, looking at her carefully for a moment. “I thought about natural, because you hear about all the medications being hard on the baby, but I just didn’t think I could handle the pain.”

“It’s daunting,” Mackenzie agrees. “But, Will was beyond supportive and I really couldn’t have done it without him. Literally. We did the acupuncture pressure points.”

“Oh right,” Honor says, sounding interested. “And that worked?”

“Totally worked. Didn’t completely cut the pain out, but definitely diluted it to a dull roar that I could try and ignore,” Mackenzie says. “I hardly remember the pain.”

“I’ve got the incision pain to deal with now,” Honor says.

“I’ve got the vagina pain to deal with now,” Mackenzie says.

They laugh a little.

The woman on Mackenzie’s other side leans into the conversation. “Sorry, did you say you went totally natural?”

“Yes,” Mackenzie confirms.

“I wanted to but my labour wasn’t progressing enough for these guys,” the woman says in a low voice, covered by the fact that the newly arrived baby is crying its poor head off. “They insisted we get things moving.”

“Was your baby in distress?” Mackenzie asks sympathetically.

“I don’t think so,” the woman says, unsure. “I don’t remember them saying that, I think they were just bored. How long was your labour?” She asks Mackenzie.

“From the moment I felt cramping to the moment I had Charlie in my arms?” She does some quick counting. “About forty three hours? But I was probably only actually active for half of that time.”

The woman next to her winces. “I went twenty-two.”

Honor inserts herself back in the conversation, “I was thirty-three.”

“How long were you here for, before they wanted to intervene?” Mackenzie asks the new woman.

“I think about three hours.”

Mackenzie frowns.

“How long were you here for?” Honor asks her.

“I can’t remember exactly, but it was… I’d have to ask Will, but I think we got here around three in the afternoon and Charlie was born four hours later. No one mentioned Pitocin to us.”

“You were lucky,” the new woman says. “It’s hell. Feels like fire.”

Mackenzie feels her groin ache in sympathy.

“I was ok on the Pitocin,” Honor says. “Probably because I had an epidural.”

The other woman nods. “I ended up with one because I couldn’t handle the contractions. I’m Katya, by the way. This is Dara.”

They introduce themselves and their children again.

“Who was your OB or midwife?” Honor asks.

“Katherine Mottola,” Mackenzie answers first.

“Sandra Oswald,” Katya responds.

“I’ve heard of her,” Honor says. “I was hoping to get her but she wasn’t on shift when I came in, so I ended up with Ken Robinson.”

Mackenzie doesn’t know who either of those people are. Or if they’re OBs or midwives. “Katherine’s been my OB/GYN since I moved back to New York,” she says instead.

“My OB doesn’t have privileges here,” Honor says.

“I wanted a midwife here at Weill Cornell, and found Sandra,” Katya says. “She was great.”

‘ _Doesn’t sound so great_ ,’ Mackenzie thinks. She disregarded their birth plan.

“So, did you get cut, giving birth naturally?” Katya asks.

“No,” Mackenzie answers, feeling Charlie slow. She checks on him. He has his eyes closed, but isn’t asleep; his jaw is still working. “I had a slight tear, so I have a few stitches, but I had no interventions whatsoever. And neither did he,” she adds, meaning her son.

Katya gives her wide blue eyes. They both look to Honor on the other side, who is similarly wide eyed. Before she even voices it, Mackenzie knows Katya is going to say she was cut. Honor, having a caesarean, wouldn’t have had an episiotomy, but she was obviously cut, nonetheless. As they trade stories, about how it was after the birth, with the placenta (which Mackenzie honestly doesn’t remember expelling), and with the checks on the baby and first feedings, Mackenzie increasingly feels like she was entirely lucky, or picked very good people to be around her while she gave birth – Katherine, to start, who was down with whatever Mackenzie wanted to do almost from the moment she got pregnant, and her saint of a husband Will, who has been down with whatever Mackenzie wanted, almost from the moment they met. She couldn’t have done it the way she did without either of their full support.

Because of the c-section, Honor was trapped in a longer recovery and the baby was taken for all the checks before she got to hold him. Katya got to hold her daughter straight away, more like Mackenzie, but she struggled with the first feeding and she didn’t even know that staying awake all night with the baby was an option.

“I don’t mean I was awake all night,” Mackenzie clarifies. “I just heard someone suggest that really focusing in on getting him to the breast every chance I got was a really good way to get him used to it. We stayed skin-to-skin and if I woke and he was awake, then I’d try and get him on and it seems to have worked out ok.”

“Who told you that?” Honor asks.

“I think – I can’t remember. A breastfeeding advice website? I’ve read so much stuff.”

“Oh me too,” Katya jumps in. “Any advice I could get my hands on.”

“How did women give birth before the internet?” Honor jokes.

Mackenzie lifts the edge of Charlie’s lip to break the suction of his mouth at her nipple and sits him upright. His dozy eyes come open, blinking lazily, and she puts one breast away, and gets the other one out. She moves him to the other side, not being particularly gentle about it, so he wakes up a bit more to take the other breast.

“What was his weight?” Honor asks.

“Nine pounds, twelve,” Mackenzie answers, securing her son to her right nipple. Susan misses it (she’s engrossed with the young mother and clearly very new baby on the other side of the room), but she would have been impressed. 

Honor winces. “Big boy.”

“And you only had a few stitches?” Katya asks, amazed.

“Yeah,” Mackenzie confirms, feeling a little like an anomaly.

Honor and Katya compare the weights of their babies. Daniel was eight pounds, one ounce; Dara seven pounds, two ounces.

“What position were you in to birth?” Katya asks.

“Hands and knees on the bed,” Mackenzie answers.

Katya blows air out of lips. “That would have done it. I had to be on my back.”

‘ _I did what I wanted_ ,’ Mackenzie thinks.


	49. Chapter 49

Charlie, super little nurser that he is, is done before the others. Susan gives her a certificate of participation to say she’s a champion feeder and is ready to go home. The others, she thinks, are maybe a little jealous, but she’s winning at this motherhood thing (so far), so she’s feeling golden and not a bit sorry for them. Everyone has their own shit to deal with, and she’s not in the business of gloating, just trying to get on with her own life. They swap numbers though, with promises to keep in touch.

Getting out of the recliner is much more of a bitch than getting into it. Susan puts an asleep Charlie in the bassinet while Mackenzie eases herself forward carefully, but ends up squashing her stiches anyway, so she has to leave the room biting back tears. She encounters Will in the hallway. “Were you waiting for me?” She asks, letting him take over pushing their son back to the room.

“No, just happened to be walking past at the right time,” he says.

“You should’ve come in,” Mackenzie says.

“I didn’t want to intrude,” Will deflects. Mackenzie shakes her head at him, but leans on his arm as they slowly make their way through the hospital. In their room, it’s clear that he’s packed and taken some of their things home already. The flowers that have arrived periodically over the last two days are gone, and so is their large duffle they came in with. Instead, there’s a smaller bag which will hold the last-minute things quite comfortably. Mackenzie’s lunch has arrived in her absence, and she opts to sit on the couch to eat it; she’s not a fan of the recliners. Will sits on her bed, the baby nearby, so he can keep an eye on him.

“Have you eaten?” Mackenzie asks, starting on quiche and green salad.

“I have,” Will confirms. “How did the class go?”

“Good. Totally nailed it. Your son is sleeping on my certificate of excellence.”

Will reaches into the bassinet to retrieve it. “That’s got to go on your office wall.”

“I’m thinking an expensive frame, right next to my Peabody’s.”

Will gives her a slight smile and puts the certificate on the end of the bed. “I took some of our things home.”

“I can see,” she says, giving him a smile.

“I figure, we’ll have to carry less.”

He means, she won’t have to carry anything at all; his hands will be free for the baby and the bag. Just like she searches Google, so does he, for these hints from father’s who have been through it before.

“You take good care of me,” Mackenzie says.

“I certainly try,” Will responds.

“You know,” Mackenzie says seriously. “I really couldn’t have done this the way I wanted without you.”

“I know,” Will says lightly. “You said.”

“I know, but I don’t want it to ever go un-noted, that you’re a walking saint, and I love you, and you’re an amazing husband, and father, and person,” she says forcefully, tears springing to her eyes.  
Will stares at her a moment, and she can see the slight concern in his eyes. “Well,” he starts and then gives a shrug.

“Just say ‘you’re welcome’,” Mackenzie instructs.

“You’re welcome,” he says.  

 

 

**********

 

Mackenzie takes advantage of a shower before she goes and dresses in actual proper clothes for the first time in two days. She even puts on a bra (which honestly feels uncomfortably tight). While she’s under the water, she suggests Will dress their son and he looks a little bewildered. “Do you want to do it?” He asks.

“I’ve had a monopoly on the firsts,” Mackenzie counters. “You do one.” And she leaves him to it. She picked out the going home outfit ages ago, a soft blue onesie with Peter Rabbit embroidered on the chest, and a soft blue hat that her mother sent over. The package also came with a baby blue woollen cardigan, the white buttons imprinted with Peter Rabbit and his siblings, Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail, in various poses. From the bathroom, Mackenzie can hear Charlie cry as Will changes him, but also go quiet once more as his father clearly manages to soothe him again. When she comes out, dressed herself, she finds Will and Charlie over by the window, looking out at the world. A world Charlie is about to enter when he graduates from the hospital.

Will comes over and Mackenzie gets a good look at him in his little outfit. “Aw he looks adorable!” Mackenzie gushes. “I want a photo!” She goes to get her phone. She snaps a pick of Charlie first, then one of Will and Charlie. “And he looks adorable in his Daddy’s arms,” she adds.

Will gives her an almost shy smile. Shy, but maybe a little proud. He hangs on to the baby while Mackenzie packs the last of her things and puts shoes on! Rosie comes in to do discharge, giving Mackenzie a stack of mesh underwear, maxi pads, ice packs, another pack of witch hazel pads, diapers, and baby wipes. She reminds them of the paediatric appointment on Monday, and checks they have all the numbers they need. Mackenzie thanks her profusely for her care and Will calls the car service to say they’re leaving. An orderly arrives with a wheelchair.

“Sorry, hospital policy,” Rosie says apologetically.

“I’ve been walking around,” Mackenzie points out. Rosie just gives her a look and Mackenzie, despite wanting to assert how perfectly capable she is walking her own ass out the door, acquiesces. Will gives her Charlie and takes up the smaller bag, slinging it to his shoulder and follows them out. The orderly drops them off in the lobby downstairs to wait for their ride. Mackenzie puts Charlie’s hat on, while Will puts on his coat. Then they swap so Mackenzie can do the same. A man walks into the lobby with a capsule, spots them and comes over. He introduces himself as Max; he’s one of three driver’s in the company that will have car seats for new-borns (as Charlie grows, they’ll have access to different sized car seats). Will puts Charlie in the seat, that has an insert to make sure his head doesn’t loll to the side and cut off his wind pipe. Max shows them how to do up the five-point buckle, and Will lays a blanket over the whole capsule to protect Charlie from any cold wind. Will carries the baby to the car, waiting out the front. Waiting out the front with a parking warden eyeing up the tags.

“Hey sorry, moving it now,” Max says, opening the back door for Will to put Charlie in. Mackenzie takes the bag from him, which is not heavy at all, and goes around to the other side to get in next to their son.

“You can’t park here,” the warden says.

“I’m just picking up these folks,” Max says, while Will tries to figure out how the baby’s seat clips into the base. “They’re taking their baby home,” he adds. Mackenzie misses it, but the warden gives Max a dirty look, however, he does move on. Max has to show them both how the capsule clicks into the base. He shows them how it releases, then gets Will to clip it in himself. Will gets into the front with Max, and Max heads away from the hospital. Charlie sleeps on.

Mackenzie was only in the hospital for forty-eight hours, but it feels like longer. She keeps looking at the city to see what’s changed, but nothing has. The snow is piled on the sides of the street, people are bundled in coats and hats, the sky is overcast and bleak, and she’s bringing her son home. She’s a mother, that’s what’s changed. Her phone buzzes in her pocket. It’s _her_ mother, asking how they’re doing.

 

**Good. Heading home.**

Mackenzie responds, happily. As they near their building, she’s hit with a pang of nervous excitement. Max circles the block so he can pull up right in front and she has to admit, she’s a little disappointed that Will gets to Charlie before her (though she also recognises that he needs opportunities to get in and be a Dad). He unclips the baby from the child restraint, and lifts him to his shoulder, grabbing up the blanket to cover him against the New York winter air; he gives a cry of protest at being woken. Mackenzie has their bag and she tips Max before following her husband inside. Peter is on duty and he greets them enthusiastically, coming over to take a look at the sleepy baby. He congratulates them and gives Mackenzie another bouquet of flowers that arrived between Will being there this morning, and them arriving home now.

They head up to the apartment, Mackenzie’s focus on her son. He’s blinking grey eyes at her, but she’s still not convinced he’s looking at her. His eyesight won’t be great for a while, and he can only really see the distance from her breast to her face, but she wonders how long it will be until he recognises her. Does he even understand she’s his mother? What goes through his mind?

Mackenzie doesn’t actually have her keys on her, so has to dig them from her husband’s pocket to let them into their actual apartment. Will goes in and stands in the hall, and she follows him in. And then they stand there, looking at each other, Will’s large hand at his son’s back. It’s cool inside but Mackenzie feels warm in her jacket. She puts the bag down and takes her outermost layer off. Will looks at her blankly. Instead of taking the baby off of him, she takes his sleeve and helps him free one arm at a time. Charlie gives a cry but Will drops into a jig, thanks her, and heads into the living room.

Mackenzie hangs his jacket and follows and finds him standing in the middle of the room, looking a little lost. He turns to face her. “Now what do we do?”


	50. Chapter 50

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, here we are at the end. Finally had the baby! Thank you so much for reading. And thank you for leaving comments or kudos. Maybe read you around :)

“Now what do we do?”

“A good question,” Mackenzie says. She takes her phone out to check the time and sees her mother has responded to her message. “We should skype with my parents later.”

“Now?” Will asks.

“No, now I’m going to see if Little Charlie is hungry.”

He nods and makes to hand the baby over to her.

“Wait,” Mackenzie says to him. She looks around at the immaculately tidy living room and the upright furniture. “Bedroom,” she decides. Her own bed; that sounds awesome about now. Will follows her into their bedroom, which is also perfectly orderly (a certain nocturnal elf seems to have tidied); one of the bouquets of flowers from someone is in a vase, on her dresser, a pop of colour in the room they still haven’t really gotten around to actually decorating properly.

Mackenzie sits on the mattress and kicks her shoes off, then swings her legs up and leans back against the pillows. The body pillow she was sleeping with for months is now at her back, and it’s perfectly supportive. She takes one of Will’s pillows and lays it across her lap, then takes her sweater off. She’s wearing a nursing top, but hasn’t had to contend with it or the nursing bra yet. She notices her boobs are sore, and wonders if her milk is coming it. Will stands by as she unhooks the bra and reaches up for her son. He’s still awake and when she lays him down across the pillow, he gives a mewling cry. “I guess you _are_ hungry huh?” Mackenzie says to him, getting her right arm under him, and bringing him closer. “Give me a big wide mouth and I’ll give you a nipple.”

Charlie complies, so she does too.

“You need anything?” Will asks, standing over them.

“Uhm,” Mackenzie thinks. “Yeah, actually, water. Thank you,” she adds as he goes to get her some. Mackenzie looks down at her son, sucking eagerly at her breast, alert, grey eyes staring fixedly forward. Mackenzie looks over the room. Nothing’s changed but it feels different. It feels different because her son is here. And then she spots two new frames on the wall opposite the bed. They’re slightly too far away for her to make out exactly, but one looks like the family photo one of the nurses took of them, and the other looks like the prints of Charlie’s feet. Looks like the nocturnal elf has been decorating also.

Will comes back with a bottle of the berry flavoured water she was drinking in the hospital. And a chocolate muffin. She gives him a smile and a squeeze of his hand and he smiles back at her but disappears out of their room again. Mackenzie texts her mother back to say they could skype later if she wants to. Will walks through to the bathroom, then comes back with whatever dirty washing was in the basket and disappears again. Mackenzie tugs the hat her son is wearing off his head, so she can curl her fingers around his little (not so little when it was coming out of her vagina) skull. “Your Daddy’s going to take good care of us,” she says softly. Charlie pauses for a second, then keeps sucking.

Will comes back through with Mackenzie’s hospital supplies, one hand holding his phone to his ear. He puts them in the bathroom, then disappears again, saying ‘I understand’. She assumes the baby’s things go to his room and that the rest of their things will come back to find their usual places. She’s not wrong. Her mother texts to say they’d love to; let her know when. Mackenzie checks the time. If she plans on having a nap when Charlie does, after his feed, and then factor in dinner time, and the time difference, she figures 4-5 hours from now would be good. Her mother says that’s fine. Will comes in with their toiletries, still on the phone, and puts them in the bathroom.   
Eventually, he’s got to run out of things to do.

Mackenzie picks at her muffin while she waits. Taking it apart with one hand and getting crumbs down her front. With her massive cleavage (are her boobs getting bigger?), the crumbs are lost. Will comes in with the portable bassinet and puts it on the end of the bed. “Do you think you want this in here?” He asks.

“Sure,” Mackenzie says. “But we might need a better place for it than there.”

“Yeah,” Will looks around.

“We’ll figure it out,” Mackenzie says. “Have you finished messing around out there?”

“I’m unpacking.”

“I know,” she says lightly. “Are you done?”

“Yeah,” he answers.

“Come lie with me.”

Will comes around the bed to his side and sits, taking his shoes off.

“I told Mum we’d skype later.”

“Sure.”

“After a nap.”

“Sounds good,” Will swings his legs to the bed and lays back.

“That’s ok?”

“Yeah,” he looks up at her.

“Are you tired?”

“Yeah,” he admits.

Mackenzie gives him a soft smile and feels Charlie slow at her breast. “I think my milk’s coming in.”

“Yeah?” Will raises his eyebrows at her.

“Yeah, my breasts feel heavier.”

“They look bigger.”

“You’re sweet to notice,” she teases him with a smile, and he glances away, a little embarrassed. Mackenzie follows his gaze to the wall, where the framed sonogram has now been joined by their first family photo. “I see you put a few new pictures up.”

Will looks to her again. “Yeah.”

“They’re nice.”

“I’m glad you like them.”

“I do. You must have rushed around like crazy this morning.”

Will gives a half shrug against the bed. At her breast Charlie slows to a stop, and she moves to remove him from her chest. “You’ll have to – we’ll have to – burp him now,” Will says. “If your milk is coming in.”

“Yes,” Mackenzie agrees. “Thank you for reminding me.” She sits the baby upright, to help ease any air bubbles he might have gotten in his stomach, but then she’s a little trapped, with her boob hanging out. “Can you take him?”

“Yes,” Will says, pulling himself to sit and reaching out for their son. He rests the baby against his chest and rubs his back gently. Mackenzie puts her breast away, re-clasping the nursing bra, then gets the other side ready. “I don’t think anything’s happening,” Will says on a murmur.

“Nothing might not –” Mackenzie stops herself. “He might not need it every time,” she says more coherently. She’s definitely ready for a nap. She takes their son back and puts him at her other side, using her left hand to bring the baby to her breast when he’s ready; he’s sleepier and less alert and it takes a little time.

Will lays back against his second pillow (she still has his primary pillow), and tucks his elbow behind his head to give himself some leverage. Mackenzie reaches out her free hand to him. He laces their fingers together.

‘ _This is nice_ ,’ Mackenzie thinks. Husband in one hand, baby in the other.

Will suddenly sits and draws her wedding rings from beneath his shirt. He unlocks the chain and takes them from around his neck. “Think I can give these back to you yet?”

Mackenzie props her sons head against her right arm, and reaches her left towards her husband. He slides her wedding band over her knuckles carefully, pushing the metal onto the fleshier part of her finger. It’s actually not as tight as she thought it was going to be. “That ok?” Will asks.

“Yes,” Mackenzie flexes her finger. It’s still loose enough. She extends her fingers towards her husband again, and he slides on her engagement ring. “I’m going to have to get used to wearing them again.”

Will puts the chain on his bedside table, and lies back against his pillow once more, flexing his elbow under his head for extra leverage. Mackenzie trades her hands over so she can take her husband’s hand again. “So, did I tell you I made friends at the breastfeeding class?”

“No,” Will says curiously.

“I did. Honor and Katya. They told me their birth stories.”

“How were they?”

“Horrific!” Mackenzie says quietly, but with feeling. At her breast, Charlie pauses. And then starts sucking again. “Babe, you were amazing.”

“You were amazing,” Will says seriously.

“No really,” Mackenzie gives his hand a shake. “I was listening to these women tell their stories. One ended up with a c-section.”

Will gives her an incredulous expression.

“I know! Exactly. They both ended up on Pitocin. Katya wanted to go natural but the Pitocin contractions were horrific so she got an epidural. Anyway, my point is, I don’t know what exactly you fought for on my behalf, but the birth went how I wanted it to –”

“I didn’t fight for anything,” Will says. “It was Katherine who respected the birth plan.”

“But their partners clearly didn’t step in to say no to interventions that occurred even though their babies weren’t in distress.”

Will’s lips draw into a line; his disapproval. He blinks a few times in a row, and Mackenzie can see he’s fading fast. So is Charlie, who has slowed his jaw, and is pausing periodically.

“Did you talk to Gideon?” Mackenzie changes the subject (he clearly doesn’t see that it’s a big deal, but it is to her). Looking at the sleepy face of her husband makes her feel sleepy too.

“Briefly. He’s ok. Just tired and they’re finding it hard.”

“Mm,” Mackenzie says, and wonders what the next few weeks are going to bring for her and her family. Somehow, she thinks it’s going to be ok. She has faith in their marriage like she has faith in Will. She notices Charlie has stopped feeding completely. She moves him away from her breast and Will sits again, volunteering to take him.

“Bed, right?” He asks.

Mackenzie gives a confirming nod and then tidies herself away. “Burp him though,” she remembers. She gets up to take her trousers off before getting under the covers. Will walks around the bed with their son in both arms against his chest and looks lost for a second, wondering how he’s going to rub his son’s back with his hands occupied with holding him. She watches him work it out, noticing the way he bobs awkwardly.

She gets into bed this time, beneath the covers, and sets an alarm on her phone for four hours – the maximum amount of time she’s supposed to let her son go without feeding him.

“I didn’t put a blanket in here. Do you think that’s ok?”

“I think so,” Mackenzie says as she watches Will lower him awkwardly to the portable bassinet. “It’s warm in here. You turned up the heat?”

“I did,” Will says, looking over at her. “For him. We’re meant to keep his room warm, right?”

“Yeah,” Mackenzie confirms. “It’s fine. It’s good,” she assures him. She watches her husband fuss with the blanket, tucking it against their son (she assumes well away from his face, but she doesn’t check, even though she can’t see from her slumped position in bed – she trusts him). And then she watches as Will straightens up and looks around, trying to decide where he’s going to put his son, now that he’s tucked into bed. The biggest surface is her dresser. He moves the flowers to his (his dresser is much taller than hers), and then moves their son to the furniture. It will do for now.

Mackenzie slides further down the bed and remains on her back. Ah, heavenly. “I haven’t slept on my back in months,” she says. She hears her husband draw one of the curtains and the rustle of his clothes against his skin as he removes something. He gets into bed next to her and as soon as he’s settled and it’s clear he’s staying over there, Mackenzie moves. She turns onto her side and slides across the bed towards him. It’s not dark, and she can see his face clearly as his eyes open to see what she’s doing. She shifts to lay against his side, resting her head on his shoulder. His hand comes to her arm and she drapes hers over his ribs, embracing him. “Haven’t been able to do this in a while either,” she murmurs. Her stomach has by no means returned to normal, but it’s enough to let her get closer to her husband again.

“Hm,” he hums. “It’s nice.”

“It is,” she agrees. He smells nice too, even though she doesn’t think he’s showered today. She can feel the scratch of his beard against her forehead. She really can’t remember the last time they lay this close. “We made a baby Will,” she says.

“Yeah,” he breathes.

“You and I.”

“Yeah,” he agrees.

“Did you think we’d ever get here?”

“There were times when I obviously did not.”

“I’m so glad you were wrong.”

“Me too,” Will says softly.

“I love you,” Mackenzie says.

“I love you too,” Will echoes.

 


End file.
